1. How many Australians are enrolled to vote?
There are 15,676,659 voters enrolled, 95% of the population aged 18 or over.
2. How many people have already voted?
By 29 June, nearly 1.8 million people had voted early, compared with just over 1.2 million for the same period in 2013. And about 800,000 postal votes have been returned.
3. How are votes counted?
On election night House of Representative and Senate ordinary ballot papers and pre-poll ballot papers completed by voters within their division are counted to first preferences. This produces a first preference count and an indicative two-candidate-preferred count in the House of Representatives, which is usually sufficient to determine which party will form government. There are 150 seats in the House of Representatives so 76 seats are a majority – for either the Coalition of Liberals and Nationals led by the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, or the opposition Labor party led by Bill Shorten. The Greens, led by Richard Di Natale, are polling at about 10% of first-preference votes and hope to pick up one or two more seats to add to their sole MP in the last federal parliament, Adam Bandt in Melbourne.
After polling day, absentee and prepoll votes are sent to be counted in the electoral division in which the voter lives. The Australian Electoral Commission is obliged to wait 13 days for postal votes mailed before polling day, meaning in close contests a result may not be available until after the 13 days have elapsed.
In the House of Representatives count, candidates with the fewest votes are successively eliminated and ballots are redistributed according to preferences on the ballots until one candidate achieves a majority. That candidate is elected. A full allocation of preferences is then conducted to determine the two-party-preferred result. Most of those who vote Greens on first preferences plump for Labor candidates over the Coalition, for instance.
Australians are also electing 76 senators – 12 from each of the six states and two from each of the Northern Territory and ACT. In the Senate count, candidates are elected when they achieve a quota (proportion of the vote). Surplus votes from elected candidates (votes in excess of the quota they need), are transferred to the candidates who were the second choice of voters on those ballot papers. Because it is not possible to determine which votes actually elected the candidate and which votes were surplus, all the elected candidate’s ballot papers are transferred at a reduced value. To complete the count, unelected candidates with the lowest number of votes are excluded and their preferences are distributed.
4. How many polling places are there?
There are 7,000 polling places, 94 overseas missions and 41 mobile teams.
5. At which booth will the most number of votes be cast?
The polling place at Australia House in London was the biggest of the 2013 federal election with just over 15,000 votes, and the Australian Electoral Commission expects it will be again.
6. How do we determine which senators serve three-year and six-year terms?
Normally, all senators from the states serve six-year terms, with half the Senate up for re-election every three years. In a double-dissolution election such as this one, the entire Senate is elected at the same time, requiring a mechanism to decide who gets a cosy six-year term and who has to face the people again in three years.
As psephologist and ABC election blogger Antony Green explains, it is up to the Senate to determine how the short- and long-term senators are selected.
At previous double-dissolution elections, the six-year terms have gone to the six senators who were elected first (those who received a quota first).
But the Coalition and Labor have resolved to use a new method in which Senate votes are recounted to determine which of the 12 elected senators would have been elected if it were a half-Senate election. Those six are then rewarded with the six-year terms.
Green writes in his blog: “The difference between the two methods will be greatest where a party achieves more than the double-dissolution quota of 7.69%, but less than the 14.29% quota at a half-Senate election. Parties that fall between these two percentage votes would be allocated long-term seats under the order elected method, but short-term seats under the recount method.
“This is most likely to have an impact on the Greens in New South Wales and Queensland where the two methods are likely to produce different results on whether Labor or the Greens are allocated long-term seats.”
7. Has youth enrolment increased?
Although voting is compulsory in Australia, the AEC says 86.7% of Australians aged 18 to 24 are enrolled. The 13.3% that are missing from the roll number 254,432. An AEC spokesman said it was a “a vast improvement from the stats in 2013” when approximately 400,000 18- to 24-year-olds were estimated to be missing.
8. How many people will vote for the first time?
There are 192,063 18-year-olds and 228,404 19-year-olds enrolled to vote, meaning at least 420,467 young Australians will vote for the first time.
10. Who is going to win?
Guardian Australia’s poll of polls estimates the Coalition government will receive 50.71% of the two-party-preferred vote, meaning the Coalition would be likely to win the election if it were held today on a reduced majority. But polls can be wrong. Last election the Coalition received 53.49% of the two-party-preferred vote.
11. How many seats would Labor win if that swing was uniform nationwide?
The poll of polls suggests a 2.78% two-party-preferred swing against the government, which would deliver Labor seven seats. However, swings are rarely uniform. For example the eighth most marginal Coalition seat is Eden-Monaro which sits on a 2.9% swing, but is tipped as a Labor gain.
12. How many seats does Labor have to win to form office?
At the 2013 federal election, the Liberal/National Coalition won 90 seats, Labor won 55, and independents and minor parties won five.
After redistributions, a Labor seat was abolished in NSW and a Liberal seat was created in Western Australia; three other Liberal seats in NSW have become notionally Labor. This has the net effect of giving Labor two extra seats at the expense of the Liberal party.
Assuming the LNP recaptures Clive Palmer’s seat of Fairfax, we can assume that the parties enter the election with the following number of seats: the Coalition with 89, Labor with 57, the Greens with one, Katter’s Australia party with one and two independents.
As a result, Labor needs to gain 19 seats to form majority government, which would require a uniform swing of 4.0%.
13. What do the betting markets say?
The predictive value of betting markets is contentious, but an analysis of odds puts the Coalition’s implied probability of victory at somewhere between 85% and 90%.
14. How do I vote in the Senate?
Voters can either number at least six boxes above the line, voting for the parties or groups of candidates in that order; or number at least 12 boxes below the line.
If a voter just votes one above the line, the vote will still be counted but it will exhaust after that group’s candidates have been elected or eliminated. Because of Senate voting reforms, parties do not lodge preferences with the AEC, and putting one above the line will therefore not result in votes being distributed according to that party’s preference.
Parties still distribute how-to-vote cards for the Senate, and voters choose whether to fill in those preferences above or below the line.
15. Will the winning party have a majority in the Senate?
No, not unless there is a landslide not predicted by any polls. The Greens, other minor parties and independents have a record high vote, attracting 25% of support in Newspoll and more than 20% in ReachTel. That, combined with Senate quotas being halved in a double dissolution, suggests neither the Coalition nor Labor can get a Senate majority.
The Australia Institute has estimated that of the 76 senators, the Coalition might win between 30 and 35, Labor could win between 25 and 28, and the Greens nine to 10. The Nick Xenophon Team could win three to four seats in South Australia. Ben Oquist, the Australia Institute’s executive director, also predicted it is likely Pauline Hanson will win in Queensland and Jacqui Lambie will be returned in Tasmania.
16. Where have the leaders been?
Not surprisingly, the vast bulk of the campaigning has been in marginal seats. Our campaign tracker shows each leader has held or attended more than 60 campaign events in marginal seats.
In contrast, both leaders have held only about 16 events each in safe seats.
Here’s every one of the electorates Malcolm Turnbull has visited over the campaign:
And Bill Shorten:
With more detail here.
17. How much has been promised?
While we’ve been tracking the dollar values of items promised on the campaign trail by each leader (and not promises made by other party politicians), the Coalition has frequently spruiked the value of items from the federal budget delivered on 3 May, and has thus not announced as many new “promises” as Labor. These include $48bn in company tax cuts over 10 years and other measures.
As it stands, the dollar values of items promised by Labor is $18.9bn, and this includes values over multiple years, and spending that in some cases is offset by other savings.
The amount of non-budget items promised by the Coalition amounts to $3.4bn, and again includes values over multiple years and items that may be offset with other savings.
Because of these multiple caveats, each party’s campaign spending amounts aren’t directly comparable dollar-for-dollar, but they are an interesting indication of party priorities.
In broad categories, the Coalition’s announcements most frequently focus on the economy, infrastructure, health, sport and education. Labor’s focus is on education, infrastructure, health, the economy and Indigenous affairs.
If you’re interested in an item-by-item breakdown of spending promises by each party (rather than leader) check out Crikey’s excellent cash tracker.
18. Where can I go to vote or get a sausage sanger*?
If you want to know where to vote, which electorate you’re in, or find a polling place with a sausage sizzle, you can use Google’s map of electorates and polling places, democracy sausage, and snagvotes.
* Also known as sausage sandwich, sausage in bread or sausage sizzle.
19. When will we know the results?
For the lower house, which determines who forms government, this really depends on how close the outcome is.
In 2013, the ABC called the outcome for the Coalition at 7.15pm AEST, and the Australian Electoral Commission had determined the outcome for all seats but one by 11.30pm AEST.
Current polling indicates the Coalition will be returned, albeit with a reduced majority in the House of Representatives. Because of the closer margin in some seats, this may result in the election being called later than 2013.
In the 2010 election, which resulted in a hung parliament, at least five seats were still in doubt by the end of the night, and it took weeks for the minority government to be formed.
20. Who should I vote for?
If you’re still undecided on who to vote for on Saturday, you can see which party’s policies you most agree with with our policy quiz, which might help inform your decision.
