AU" 2HAL IA
PRIME MINISTER Press Statement No. 447
11 February 1975
THE SENATE
The decision of the N. S. W. Cabinet denies the
people of N. S. W. the representation for which they decisively
voted in May 1974. For the second time in nine months the
Liberal and Country Parties have attempted to set aside the
clear verdict of the electors. In April 1974 Liberal and
Country Party Senators set the dangerous precedent of refusing
the elected government the money it needs to govern.
Their counterparts in N. S. W. now propose to override the
unbroken precedent for filling casual vacancies in the Senate.
The Senate is elected by the system of proportional
representation. The system is specifically designed to ensure
that within each State the parties secure representation
in proportion to the votes cast in their favour. The grouping
of candidates according to party on the ballot paper is a
very specific acknowledgement of the party nature of Senate
elections. The N. S. W. decision completely undermines the
purpose of the proportional system.
In N. S. W. Australian Labor Party candidates for the
Senate polled 200,000 first preference votes more than
their Liberal and Country Party opponents 50 per cent of
the formal votes compared with 41.67 per cent for the Liberal-
Country Party. The effect of the N. S. W. Cabinet decision is
to give 50 per cent of the N. S. W. electors four senators and
41.67 per cent six senators. In Australia as a whole,
Australian Labor Party candidates polled 250,000 votes more
than the Liberal-Country Party candidates 47.29 per cent
against 43.42 per cent. The N. S. W. decision gives the 47 per cent
twenty-eight senators and the 43 per cent thirty senators.
This is a travesty.
The N. S. W. proposal would completely overturn the
intention of the electors of N. S. W. It would completely reverse
N. S. W. representation in the Senate. It would make the Senate
as a whole even less representative of the opinion of the
electors recorded in May. Instead of a Senate elected with
twenty-nine Labor senators, twenty-nine Liberal and Country
Party senators and two Independent senators there will be only
twenty-eight Labor senators. A further distortion of the
verdict of the people arises from today's announcement by
Senator Townley that he will join the Liberal Party. He was
elected as an Independent and very probably because he was
an Independent. Even without this N. S. W. move the opposition in
the Senate is able to defeat every piece of government legislation.
A Senate so composed is completely lacking in legitimacy.
It just does not reflect the will of the people. / 2
-2-
It was astonishing for Mr Lewis to put forward so
outrageous a proposition. It is unbelievable that in the
sober light of day this " mad" act as Mr Gorton put it,
should receive the full backing of the N. S. W. Cabinet. It
is further astonishing that this support should be forthcoming
after the proposal has been repudiated by the Leader of
the Opposition, Mr Snedden. Very correctly Mr Snedden said,
" The convention has served us very well. You never know when
it might operate in reverse." Mr Snedden might well apply
this insight to an even older and more important convention
that the Senate does not refuse supply.
The fact is that the Liberal and Country Parties,
federal and state, have shown their readiness to tear up
the rules whenever it suits them. The parliamentary system
everywhere is under challenge. Throughout the world more
and more people are losing faith in that system. No system,
certainly not one so complex and delicate and difficult as
the Australian parliamentary system, can long sustain repeated
onslaughts on its basic assumptions and conventions. The
Conservative parties who used to arrogate to themselves the
title of defenders of the parliamentary system are now
subverting it.
This is an act of sabotage against the Senate, an
act of sabotage against the clear will of the people of
an act of sabotage against the Constitution and an
act of sabotage against the whole parliamentary system in
Australia. CANBERRA. A. C. T.