Australian federal election, 2010

The parliamentary election in Australia in 2010 was held on August 21, 2010. It was the election for the 43rd Australian Parliament. Of the two chambers of parliament, the House of Representatives (lower house ) was completely and partially re-elected to the Senate (upper house).

This led to a hung parliament, that is, to a stalemate between the laboratory and the opposition Liberal- National Party. After negotiations led to the formation of a Labor minority government, which relies on the support of four deputies from other parties or party independents.

Prehistory

From the parliamentary election in Australia 2007, the Labor Party had emerged under its then top candidate Kevin Rudd as the winner. Rudd was elected Prime Minister. However, in the course of his tenure, there was a dramatic drop in popularity of the Labor government, so that it came in June 2010 to an intra-party revolt of Rudd's opponent in the right wing of the Party of Labor. Rudd was ousted as party leader of the laboratory and renounced after he had so lost the parliamentary backing on to stand for the office of prime minister. His party colleague Julia Gillard, the current Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education, work and social balance on June 24, elected Prime Minister of Australia - In its place was - somewhat surprising for the public. A few weeks after their election, the new Prime Minister announced on July 17 announced that parliamentary elections would be held on 21 August of the year.

Candidates

The Prime Minister Julia Gillard was the top candidate of the ruling Labor Party. Top candidate of the opposition was Tony Abbott, leader of the Liberal Party. With the Liberal Party joined in a coalition, the National Party was led by Warren Truss. In the state of Queensland, the Liberal National Party ( Liberal National Party ) came to, which was created in 2008 from a merger of the two bourgeois parties. In addition, the Green Party of Australia approached under Bob Brown. As a smaller party, the 2% of the vote and no seats won at the last election was the Family First Party in the race. Ultimately turned out to voters mainly the choice between a continuation of laboratory single-party government and a coalition government of the Liberal and National Party of Australia.

Tony Abbott (LPA ), candidate of the opposition

Warren Truss ( National Party )

Bob Brown (Greens)

Forecasts

Pre-election polls showed a gradual decline of the laboratory in voter support since the last election in 2007. In parallel, the poll numbers of the opposition coalition parties. The Greens remained in the survey results by 10%.

Electioneering

The main themes of the campaign were the economic situation, the question of securing the borders of Australia against illegal immigration and the problem of global climate change. In its election campaign opening the Prime Minister Gillard spoke of the " progress of Australia " ( "moving forward" ) under its government and named as targets a stronger economy, balanced budgets and a global model of health and education system. Opposition leader Abbott criticized the speech as in content, made ​​fun of Gillard's constantly repeated moving -forward mantra and threw laboratory before to have the votes cast at the last election promises not kept. He expected the election campaign a smear campaign ("a filthy campaign" ) on the part of laboratories. The Green Party leader Senator Bob Brown accused both parties to indulge only in mutual insults and to have major problems as a possible CO2 tax (carbon tax) unmentioned. A topic on the edge was the religious attitude of the two leading candidates. Gillard is declared atheist, but has, at its expressions of respect for the Church and for religious beliefs. Abbott, however, is an avowed Catholic, what some church leaders, as the Archbishop of Perth, Barry Hickey, led to expressions of professing Christians could be misled by the atheism of the Prime Minister to not choose laboratory. This meant that the Prime Minister increasingly sought a dialogue with church groups before the election.

Of the electoral law

Were entitled to vote 14,088,260 Australians. In Australia, voting is compulsory. A total of 150 members of the House ( House of Representatives ) were elected in as many single-member constituencies for a ranking option (instant runoff voting). An average constituency has 93 921 voters ( Minimum: 59 879 in the constituency Solomon (NT ), Maximum: 124,215 in constituency Canberra). According to the imbalance in population density, the constituencies are of extremely different sizes (see map above ). The largest constituency Durack in Western Australia is 1,587,758 km2 in area with more than four times as large as Germany alone during the urban areas of Melbourne and Sydney include 20 constituencies. In the current election 40 of the 76 members of the Australian Senate were elected ( the upper house ). The election took place following an election mode with communicable Einzelstimmgebung. Before the election, the electoral boundaries were redrawn in part by the Australian Electoral Commission due to the changing population ratios.

Results

Won constituencies by state

The constituencies gained are distributed among the states and administrative units of New South Wales (NSW), Victoria ( VIC), Queensland ( QLD), Western Australia (WA), South Australia ( SA), Tasmania (TAS), Australian Capital Territory (ACT ) and Northern Territory (NT) as follows:

House of Representatives

Senate

Newly elected, 40 seats of the Federal States (6 per State, 36 in total) as well as the seats of the territories (2 per territory ). The distribution of these newly elected seats is given in the column " won seats ". The column " seats total " shows the number of mandates, including the 36 seats that were not choice.

These are separate elections for each individual state and each territory. The table below shows the summarized results. Because of the separate elections, the distribution of votes, however, is not directly translated into the allocation of seats.

After the election

Both Labor and the National Liberal coalition had with each 72 seats short of an absolute majority in the House, for at least 76 seats are required. A determining factor was the voting behavior of the six so-called cross - benchers, so MPs who are not members of the two major parties. They include four independent, a member of the National Party of Western Australia ( sitting in the National party room, but not in the Coalition party room) and a member of the Greens. The Green MP Adam Bandt and three of the Independent (the former Green Andrew Wilkie and the two former National Liberal Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor ) said they would support a minority government laboratory under certain conditions. Two Independent, Bob Katter and a member of the National Party of Western Australia, Tony Crook, declared their support for the coalition. This has Prime Minister Julia Gillard in the House a majority vote for their government and exactly the required minimum number for an absolute majority ( 76:74 MPs). The 150 is the voice of the President of Parliament, who has the right to vote only in the case of undecided choice. The Liberal Party has failed to comply with the agreement with the Labor Party, after the President of the Parliament generally has no right to vote. Without right to vote by the Speaker, the majority would be in the ratios 76:73 for the Labor government.