Talk:2016 Australian federal election/Archive 4

Sharkie
I'm not sure when to start writing articles for new members. I have created Draft:Rebekha Sharkie in preparation. --Scott Davis Talk 07:00, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
 * For anyone certain of election (like Sharkie), they can be mainspace whenever. All members of parliament (including senators) assumed office yesterday; we just don't know exactly who some of them are yet. :) Frickeg (talk) 07:32, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Yep, we should start getting articles up now. As Frickeg said, their terms have technically already started, and this kind of situation is precisely the parliament at which people are most likely to be searching for information on these people. I do think some of our calls are a bit questionable and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the closest ones wind up changing, but there is zero chance of someone like Sharkhie losing so an article ASAP would be good. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 07:37, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

Result Source
Can we please agree that only official sources (such as AEC) ought to be used for the election results, and not websites of tv stations or news papers? &#9798; CUSH &#9798; 21:40, 2 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I'm with you on this one, even though AEC isn't showing two-party preferred counts for some seats like Grayndler. We don't have to be in a hurry to predict ahead of the AEC, that's what news media are for.
 * The table in section "Results – Overall" matches AEC; is "Divisions in Doubt" based on their Close Seats list? Should we be offering some explanation or summary of the Not yet Determined number?
 * Pelagic (talk) 00:51, 3 July 2016 (UTC) [edited 01:38, 3 July 2016 (UTC)]
 * Yes, I was going to do that today. --Canley (talk) 02:07, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Damn, you beat me to it! :) Here's the section that I was about to commit:

Divisions not yet determined
As of midday on the day following the poll, the Australian Electoral Commission listed seven divisions as "not yet determined", pending counting of postal votes and distribution of preferences.

Five of the seven divisions were previously classified as "safe seats" (Higgins "fairly safe" and O'Connor "marginal"), and the incumbents of all seven were leading in primary votes.

If all seven divisions are held, that would bring the count of parliamentary seats to 73 for Labor and 72 for the coalition.

Numbers for each candidate are the count of primary (first-preference) votes.


 * [I need to put this in a collapsible box when I find out how] Pelagic (talk) 02:57, 3 July 2016 (UTC) [edit: found the collapse top template, but unsure how to intent it. 03:55, 3 July 2016 (UTC)]


 * Oh, sorry! Great table, not sure if I would be so specific with the vote numbers, I have just listed the ABC prediction, but feel free to adjust or replace if you want. --Canley (talk) 03:18, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Canley, but your table looks much better. The primary votes will be stable until the postals are counted; I've no idea how long that takes.  I'm tempted to include the numbers, but it might make the table too cluttered. Pelagic (talk) 03:55, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Perhaps I'm putting too much emphasis on the postals with the numbers above. I think you're right about leaving them out.  Does anyone know why the AEC is withholding two-candidate-preferred numbers for these seats but not for the close seats?  They are calling a front-runner now for Grey even though only a handful of polling places have returned TCP.
 * Thanks for putting in the prediction column, I think it helps the reader to get an idea of where these seat are likely to go. Pelagic (talk) 11:53, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I see the "divisions in doubt" section has been re-aligned with the AEC close seats, and the explanation about ABC's threshold works well.
 * One last concern: are we putting too much emphasis on ABC at the expense of other media outlets? The different seat counts being bandied about are confusing, but is that variation notable in itself?  Or will nobody care once the results are finalised?
 * Pelagic (talk) 11:53, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
 * If you look at previous federal and state election articles, we have traditionally used Antony Green's ABC election resources as reliable sources, almost always in preference to other media outlets, due to the depth and scope of of his coverage. That said, Green's focus is very much on election night coverage, and projecting the preference distribution and outcomes based on computer models, and that is why I would prefer to use the AEC count data and definitions where possible. Also, Wikipedia does tend to favour secondary sources (ABC) over primary sources (AEC), although both can be used. However the trouble with using media sources for election results at all is that once they have moved on (and this includes the ABC), they stop updating/correcting the data. Some do this either immediately after election night. ABC will usually follow through with the final counting, but even they can't really be used as an archive as errors occur at every election which are never fixed, or the data presented is a simulation which is indicative but not identical to the actual count.


 * Anyway, the reason I mentioned the ABC threshold and seats in doubt is that the AEC threshold is very low, and I just wanted to point out that some of the seats listed as "changing hands" on the list here are still too close to call (as there is already the usual discussion about which new MPs to create articles for)—using a list from a reliable media outlet which had a broader list of seats to watch was preferable to arbitrarily choosing a different threshold. --Canley (talk) 12:58, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

AEC accuracy
I have tagged the article for accuracy since we are using AEC figures in the infobox, and Antony Green has come out and said that they're just plain wrong. StAnselm (talk) 21:42, 4 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I support the tagging, but not the justification. The numbers aren't "wrong", they are incomplete, and the AEC automated conclusions are misleading, so some of the projected outcomes are likely to be proved wrong in the next few days. It could be worth noting that the outcomes were not all known in the first few days following the election as counting continued. --Scott Davis Talk 23:12, 4 July 2016 (UTC)
 * As Scott says, the AEC figures are not "plain wrong", and that's not really what Antony Green is saying. What the AEC is doing is listing seats where one candidate is ahead for that party, but using a very low threshold for a close seat (which is all discussed above and noted on the page), and only excluding the 6 not yet determined seats with a non-classic 2CP throw. The main reason Antony needed to explain it is that the AEC shows Labor quite a few seats ahead (71–67), but ABC has them one seat behind (67–68). This can be handled with notes and explanations where it isn't already, and will resolve itself in the next day or two as the count progresses and the number firm up. --Canley (talk) 23:56, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Template
What's the deal with this new election template (on articles like Candidates of the Australian federal election, 2016)? It hasn't been discussed that I've seen, the whole series of articles (especially redlinks) don't exist for our extensive coverage of other elections, some of the bluelinks are of very dubious notability, and the results pages (bizarre when seat counting is not even close to done) are at a different title to all other elections. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 13:49, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * The articles linked to in the template seem to be promising an incredible amount of content—a combination of results for every division in each state and territory, any seat polling done in that division, and a very lengthy analysis of the campaign at seat level. If the editor has the time and inclination to complete 150 such summaries, then go for it I guess. My only concerns would be that a lot of the material will be duplicated (there is already a list of seat-level polling, I will do results summaries for each state), it requires a lot of updating while the count is underway, and there is a possible technical issue with how many templates MediaWiki can handle on a page, and large states like NSW and Victoria may not save correctly if they include the results tables. --Canley (talk) 06:57, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Mal changing the voting rules to his benefit
Is there any information on how much the changing the voting laws to his benefit (by removing minor parties) and or the DD just to extend the benefit of the new laws actually hurt instead of benefited him? --Thelawlollol (talk) 10:18, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Do you have any articles which discuss whether it helped or not? We can't be doing our own original analysis. Stickee (talk) 23:52, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

Thats why I asked if they existed! DERP. No can just put in massive swags of claims all over the wikiblog without any reference.--Thelawlollol (talk) 07:00, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
 * "Changing the voting laws to his benefit" - wrong, and never true; a cynical lie. The DD is open to question, but would have to be cited to analysis that I doubt will be available until the Senate count is finalised. Frickeg (talk) 07:44, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Infobox and bar graphs
I have removed the number of primary votes, percentages and 2PP calculations from the infobox and commented out the bar graphs. The numbers changing so often and are too specific anyway, they can all be restored when the count is stable, and at them moment every update has to be changed in three places. --Canley (talk) 05:08, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Waiting for seats to be declared
This discussion is relevant to this page and connected pages. Frickeg (talk) 12:58, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Update, now
Just coming from AEC, Coalition and Labor are at par (50.00% each, two party count) 49.200.244.124 (talk) 13:24, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
 * It's going all over the place, I'm hesitant to keep updating it or displaying two decimal places as it is so variable. Also: I originally had a note in there saying that the 2PP figures were calculated from classic division counts only, but the AEC put up a statement saying it was from all 150 divisions (which I found very unlikely). They have since reworded the statement, and Antony Green confirms that the 16 non-classics are excluded at this point. I have put the note back—as exciting as it is that it's so close, it will change quite a bit when they finish the main 2CP count and begin the 2PP count. --Canley (talk) 04:54, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

May I suggest, then, that the infobox be altered so that it shows that the election is still ongoing. It's better to update it after the end of the count and until then the results, as they come in, can be written in the Results section only. But it's only a suggestion: it might be fine even the way it is right now. 49.200.244.105 (talk) 16:16, 8 July 2016 (UTC) PS: Maybe if you didn't understand I mean put the election as it was before the polls, ie. seats needed for a majority, etc.

Division results tables
As per last election, I've scripted an output of results tables for each division by state/territory based on the AEC data as of last night (Sunday 10 July). As in 2013, although many seats will be declared in the next week or so, the AEC does not mark the results as final until about a month after the election. Updating the data from AEC and regenerating the tables only takes a few minutes so I can keep them updated for interest's sake fairly regularly, and then produce the final output for placement in division articles, results lists and state summaries.

There are still a few fixes I need to do, such as adding wikilinks for all winners, if anyone spots any errors other than count updates, please feel free to edit the page in my userspace or mention them below, and I'll pick it up in the history and fix it in later outputs.

The tables are in my userspace here:
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Australian Capital Territory
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/New South Wales
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Northern Territory
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Queensland
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/South Australia
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Tasmania
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Victoria
 * User:Canley/Australian federal election, 2016/Results/Western Australia

--Canley (talk) 04:02, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

Use of bold
I assert that bold formatting for totals is not necessary, and is contrary to MOS:BOLD. In particular, these are not table headers. The only reason I can see for making them bold is for emphasis - but emphasis is one the explicit cases when not to use boldface. So I removed the bold, but disagrees and restored the bold, on the grounds that "Bolding in this manner is standard in election infoboxes".

I suggest that MOS should take priority and that the "standard in election infoboxes" should change to comply with MOS. Other editors' opinions are sought, along with any reasons why MOS should not apply here. Mitch Ames (talk) 12:48, 8 July 2016 (UTC)


 * MOS:BOLD clearly needs quite a re-write. The practice of bolding of in this way is standard across infoboxes for nearly all countries, for example: Germany, France, Turkey, Japan, Brazil, the United Kingdom, and of course across the Australian federal election articles including 2013, 2010, and 2007. The 2010 article particularly demonstrates the reason why we use bold as sometimes the winner of the most seats and the winner of the popular vote are not the same, we may well end up with a situation like that in this instance too (though increasingly it looks like Coalition will have more seats and the largest share of the popular vote but you never know). I'm not really seeing a reason why the use of bold is an objectivly bad thing it adds to the article and makes it clearer to the reader. Ebonelm (talk) 14:43, 8 July 2016 (UTC)


 * That it might be "standard" in infoboxes is irrelevant. ' edits were not to the infobox, they were to tables, and were in accordance with MOS:BOLD, well mostly. If you need to emphasise something, use italics. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 16:35, 8 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I have partially self-reverted. The reason why I initially reverted was because the infobox bold was removed which as I showed above is standard. I didn't realise that other parts of the page were changed as well. The infobox had been bolded and then unbolded a couple of times before and I misread the purposes of the rest of the edit. I trust the bold in the infobox will be retained. Ebonelm (talk) 17:47, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Focussing on the infobox now, I notice that Infobox election includes the use of bold formatting (''') in the Usage section of the documentation but then is not consistent with the use of bold for winners' counts/percentages in the examples. I still assert that the use of bold here is contrary to MOS:BOLD, and I've raised the matter at Template talk:Infobox election. Mitch Ames (talk) 13:48, 9 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm in agreement Mitch, it's clear their shouldn't be boldface as per the MOS. Stickee (talk) 04:03, 11 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I'd appreciate it if you would also repeat your support at Template talk:Infobox election. Ultimately it is reasonable that this article follow the usage and examples sections of the template documentation. If it is to change, such change needs to happen in the template first.
 * Likewise I invite other editors (including those who disagree with me) to continue the discussion on the template talk page. Mitch Ames (talk) 09:55, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

Vote counting photos
The AEC has published some media photos of the count at http://www.aec.gov.au/media/image-library/dec-votes.htm under CC-BY-3.0 so they should be suitable for use on this article if required. --Scott Davis Talk 02:58, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Layout of the article
I don't know why the results is below the introduction and the background section is pushed down. Can someone explain why? Why not change the layout? --George Ho (talk) 19:50, 12 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I suppose it is because readers are much more likely to be looking for current results than background detail like the constitutional basis for the polling date or by-elections. The results were moved chronologically to the end of the article last week, but the article was so long they were hard to find, and someone moved it back. Previous articles in the series have the results at the top after the intro as it is one of the key items of information. --Canley (talk) 03:27, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Lead section
Nothing against the current state of the introduction section. However, MOS:LEAD encourages using very few inline citations (and some rewrite). Nevertheless, I don't know how controversial the topic is to introduce to readers unfamiliar with the topic. The whole body has citations already, so having inline citations in lead makes lead look probably silly to read, or I don't know how to put it. Maybe cut out a lot of inline references? Otherwise, what are other suggestions? --George Ho (talk) 07:23, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Controversy/"Mediscare" section
This "Mediscare" issue is clearly one of the deciding factors and is going to be one of the big talking points of this election, especially now as Shorten has admitted/confirmed that Qld Labor sent that infamous "fake Medicare" text message. I feel like this will need its own section to discuss the issue and the fall out. Currently its only mention is in the Bob Hawke ad and the AMA comments, but nothing about the fraudulent text message. Thoughts? Ck786 (talk) 23:58, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Sure, it absolutely should be mentioned, and could probably be in a section, but we should just be careful about throwing around terms like "admitted", "fake" and "fraudulent". --Canley (talk) 00:40, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree that it should be discussed in the article, but absolutely not in its own section - rather, in an election issues section. I have particular NPOV concerns about the way Ck786 is phrasing it, because - as many, many commentators have discussed in the last couple of days - the Labor side of that argument (that it amounted to shorthand for fears about recent past (and present) Liberal attempts to dismantle Medicare-as-we-know-it, such as the imposition of forced co-payments) needs to go in if the Liberal side of that story does. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 05:45, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * It should be treated along with the Tories' pumped up lies and distortions about negative gearing, the war on business, etc. Not by itself. Tony   (talk)  13:51, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * The Liberals? Anti-Medicare? There's nothing in the history of the universe to even suggest such a thing. Surely you jest. To successfully deny an accusation, one has to first have credibility on the subject. No wonder it worked. Every Australian has or is listed on a Medicare card thanks to Labor, health cover which helps millions in their everyday lives in a tangible observable way, and for many people can mean the difference between eating or paying a bill. Time and time again the Liberals just don't care... introducing co-payments being the most recent of many examples. Let's just skip Fraser completely... 1993. Over two decades of sour grapes later and they're still pursuing Fightback! No, just all lies and smear. Now let's flipside this. Boat people? Really? Out of sight, out of mind. Heard of/remember Shaun Micallef's parody of one or more "olympic-size swimming pool(s)" as a unit of measurement? Often now in real life conversations, say something costs $180 million like a referendum, i'll say "that's only six Australian-Cambodian boatpeople"! I've found it to be a razor of a line, goes down so well! AU$30mil to transfer a single person to Cambodia... I wonder how many Australians have been given AU$30mil by their government? Pity the Liberals think that spending is always bad, unless of course it's about the boats, then anything goes. Principles? They have none. :) Timeshift (talk) 15:46, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Senate estimates
It is going to be a long time before the Senate is finalised and the results are going to be sensitively dependent on preference flows. Maybe we should just leave the Senate tables blank until it is announced in full. Reporting projections by pundits is not the role of an encyclopedia. Ordinary Person (talk) 11:29, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Agree. Mitch Ames (talk) 12:18, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I don't really agree, although I see your point. We do have a certain amount of information, based on quotas - we can guarantee a certain number of seats. I see the main issue being this second table that has cropped up, which doesn't really agree with the first at all, and is definitely making some very dubious calls; it should probably go, or at the very least be dramatically reconfigured and made a lot less bullish about its calls. I do think keeping the first table is reasonable, though - I don't see anything on there that is reasonably in doubt. Frickeg (talk) 14:05, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I'd probably omit the "Likely" column. Ordinary Person (talk) 17:09, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * My view is to leave the predictions table as is. Why? Most people who view the Senate results count, will have no idea of what it all means. The table nicely captures the range of possible outcomes, and is useful until the final outcome becomes known. --Mrodowicz (talk) 17:17, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

I noticed that in the WA, one seat is marked as in doubt. As far as I am aware, that seat is contested by the Greens and Nationals. However, the tally notes remarked that both the Greens and the Coalition is in contention for that last seat. I think this is in error. The WA Nationals are not in coalition with the federal Liberal-National Coalition and therefore should not be lumped together with them. 119.56.116.178 (talk) 09:09, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

Lead section (30 July 2016)
The introduction is too long for readers to read through. The MOS:LEAD says no more than four paragraphs is encouraged. --George Ho (talk) 07:34, 30 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Once all results are final and the dust has settled, there may be opportunity for moving some of the text out of the lead. The lead is ok for now - WP:MOSLEAD is a guideline, not a rule, and cannot and is not meant to apply to all situations - the article itself states "as a general rule of thumb". This still-fluid article topic is definitely not one to consider a 'rule of thumb' type of topic. I've removed the {lead too long} tag. If others disagree with me then feel free to re-add the tag, however I doubt my removal of the tag will be met with disagreement except for yourself at this point in time. Timeshift (talk) 11:38, 30 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I am not tied to a number of paragraphs, but I try to follow the principle that the lead should fit "above the fold" - a reader should not need to scroll to see the top of the table of contents. Trimming the current lead to get closer to that ideal leaves the following. Has it left out anything that needs to be in the lead?


 * The 2016 Australian federal election was a double dissolution election held on Saturday 2 July to elect all 226 members of the 45th Parliament of Australia, after an extended eight-week official campaign period. It was the first double dissolution election since the 1987 election.


 * Though federal election outcomes are traditionally called by political commentators on election night, even during the following day the outcome could not be predicted, with many close seats in play.    On 10 July, eight days after the election took place and following Malcolm Turnbull's negotiations with the crossbench where he secured sufficient confidence and supply support for the Liberal/National Coalition, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten conceded defeat, acknowledging that the incumbent Coalition had enough seats to form either a minority or majority government. Turnbull claimed victory later that day in the closest federal majority result since the 1961 election.


 * In the 150-seat Australian House of Representatives, the one-term incumbent Liberal/National Coalition government was re-elected with a reduced 76 seats, a bare one-seat majority. Resulting from the national two-party swing of more than three percent against the government, the Labor Party opposition picked up a significant number of previously government-held seats − totaling 69 seats. On the crossbench the Australian Greens, the Nick Xenophon Team, Katter's Australian Party, and independents Andrew Wilkie and Cathy McGowan won a seat each. On 19 July the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) announced a re-count for the Coalition-held but provisionally Labor-won Division of Herbert. At the start of the Herbert re-count, Labor led by eight votes. The AEC announced on 31 July that Labor had won Herbert by 37 votes.


 * The final outcome in the 76-seat Australian Senate continues to take several weeks to complete despite significant voting changes. Earlier in 2016 legislation changed the Senate voting system from a full-preference single transferable vote with group voting tickets to an optional-preferential single transferable vote. The ABC's Antony Green has shown that the Liberal/National Coalition and Labor have likely held at least 29 and 24 Senate seats respectively, and predicted a further increase to Senate crossbench numbers, with the Greens, Nick Xenophon Team, Pauline Hanson's One Nation, the Jacqui Lambie Network, Derryn Hinch's Justice Party and possibly others all likely to win Senate seats. The final Senate result and composition is expected to be known by 4 August.


 * dropped text that might be useful further down the article:
 * After a week of vote counting, still no party had won enough seats in the House of Representatives to form a majority government.  Neither the incumbent Prime Minister of Australia Malcolm Turnbull of the Liberal/National Coalition nor Opposition Leader Bill Shorten of the Labor Party were in a position to concede defeat or claim victory.  Many political commentators predicted a hung parliament.


 * Turnbull repeatedly claimed prior to the election that a vote for a Labor, Green or Independent candidate was a vote for "the Labor/Green/Independent alliance", and also refused to countenance a hung parliament. However, in the uncertain week following the election, Turnbull negotiated with the crossbench and secured confidence and supply support from Bob Katter, Andrew Wilkie and Cathy McGowan in the event of a hung parliament and resulting minority government. During crossbench negotiations, Turnbull pledged additional staff and resources for crossbenchers, and stated "It is my commitment to work in every way possible to ensure that the crossbenchers have access to all of the information they need and all of the resources they need to be able to play the role they need in this parliament".


 * the ABC declared on 11 July that the incumbent Coalition would be able to form a bare one-seat majority government


 * Have I missed anything that must be kept in the lead? I think I've still left it a bit longer than my target, but I don't want to trim further at this stage either. I endorse removing the banner tag either way. --Scott Davis Talk 12:27, 31 July 2016 (UTC)
 * That looks much better. I'd be happy with that as it is. I'm not sure the "dropped" bits are a great loss, but, as you say, they are easily reincorporated. As for the unnecessary, ugly tagging - yeah, let's not do that before even talking. --  Begoon &thinsp; talk  14:45, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

I've made some slight but effective edits to the article lead itself, how does it look now? At least for the moment, unless someone can find a way to make para one merge fluidly in to para two, I don't think that for now at least it's feasible to reduce to four paras. Five is perfectly fine... I do highly suggest all re-read the WP:MOSLEAD guideline. Timeshift (talk) 18:54, 31 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I see it as repetitive in the lead to say that there was no result after a week of counting, then to say that Shorten conceded after 8 days. The "Turnbull repeatedly claimed..." paragraph is unnecessarily detailed for the lead, but possibly appropriate further down or in a campaign article. I don't think it's important for the lead to report when the ABC thought it was settled. --Scott Davis Talk 23:05, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Photo for two candidates
Three partys with one seat get a Photo and are on the result list, why the two independents are missing , unfair 188.22.248.167 (talk) 21:59, 26 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Independents aren't a party. Quite simple. Frickeg (talk) 09:03, 27 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Quiet Plain.Are there all guy like that ?Shouldnt be that article objectv and not subjective ?? 62.46.248.125 (talk) 23:30, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
 * A really poor and plain comment by Fricker. Its like answer a question with Because it is so. 62.46.248.125 (talk) 23:31, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you as a clear newcomer to wikipedia should look around before questioning long-term editors. No matter what state or federal election, or at any election in any country in the world, you'll find that election infobox images are party leader images only, never independents. Parties contest elections hoping to win government or at least the official opposition, independents do not. What would you do with South Australian state election, 1938? Many pictures of almost half of the lower house as almost half were independent? The best way to figure out how wikipedia tends to treat something, such as your... 'concern'... is to look at existing precedent. While WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is there for a reason, in this situation, go have a look at United Kingdom general election, 2015 or Canadian federal election, 2015 or New Zealand general election, 2014, or any other election article in the world, and you'll find the same thing. Now that you understand that we don't have independent images in election infoboxes and links to similar articles, perhaps you can use this new-found skill in future before asking what others might consider rather bizarre questions? Timeshift (talk) 16:57, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
 * blablabala some other are unfair - so we do also nice when we do so - So if i name me Mr X party i get a photo - if i call me independent i get no photo - your so plain --131.130.241.2 (talk) 12:51, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Please be WP:CIVIL. We won't respond if you keep being rude and saying "blablabala". Orthogonal1 (talk) 01:54, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Lowest federal election turnout since compulsory voting was introduced in 1924
Per Antony Green's Twitter (and per wikipedia's election article turnout figures), the 2016 election's turnout figure of 91.0% is the lowest since compulsory voting was introduced in 1924. 1925 is now second-lowest at 91.4%, with 2010 and 2013 coming next on 93.x%. Historically turnout was typically 95-96%. 1925 was the first so that explains itself. With 1925 disregarded, the last three elections have produced the lowest turnouts under compulsory voting in federal history. Additionally, in the Senate, with 1925 disregarded, this election also saw at 91.9% the lowest turnout on record under compulsory voting (including the historic half-Senate only elections). 1925 aside, 2010 and 2013 again came next on 93.x%. Surely the turnout for this election being the worst and the previous two elections next-worst for both houses is no mere coincidence. Timeshift (talk) 18:24, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Members of the Australian Senate, 2016–2019 significantly outdated
Template:Australian Senators has already been updated but Members of the Australian Senate, 2016–2019 is now significantly outdated... anyone up to the task? Timeshift (talk) 02:55, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Getting there ... Frickeg (talk) 03:05, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Cheers :) Timeshift (talk) 03:19, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

Next Australian federal election created
FYI. Timeshift (talk) 21:22, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

ABC/AEC discrepancies
AEC has Labor's Senate vote swing at +0.16% while the ABC correctly has it at −0.3%. Labor got 30.11% in 2013 and 29.79% in 2016. I've been patiently waiting for the AEC to correct their calculations but they and therefore we continue to use the wrong Labor Senate swing. We have continued to incorrectly report a tiny Senate swing to Labor rather than a tiny Senate swing away from Labor... i'm actually surprised that by now, still nobody had noticed. The Greens won precisely 8.65% of the Senate vote in both 2016 and 2013, yet the AEC still incorrectly indicates a −0.58 swing in 2016. Also, the ABC only provides to one decimal place (eg: 5.5%) while the AEC provides to two decimal places (eg: 5.55%). If we want to keep listing results to two decimal places, the ABC link isn't of great help. I wonder whether the AEC have merged the 2014 WA Senate result with the overall 2013 Senate result to come up with this data? Seriously, how can Palmer have a −5.4% Senate swing against his party when they only got 4.9% in the Senate in 2013? Thoughts? Timeshift (talk) 05:40, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's exactly what the AEC have done, and I would argue that's correct as the 2013 WA results were voided. So in the examples above, if you subtract the WA 2013 results from the national totals, then add the 2014 WA special election back in, Labor has 29.63% national vote, the Greens have 9.23% and PUP 5.61%. That corresponds to the swings on the AEC site: ALP +0.16, Greens −0.58, PUP −5.42. --Canley (talk) 10:57, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
 * My mild wiki-OCD is struggling with this situation. I as much agree as disagree with you. In the 2013 article we have a Senate table that doesn't correspond to the one in the 2016 article... *eye tick*... is it possible to and would contributors warm to the idea of two national Senate result tables in the 2013 article? One for the 2013 election and then another immediately below it with WA 2014 results inserted in to it? Timeshift (talk) 11:08, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
 * That's not a bad idea. I had actually done this as an analysis out of interest (replacing the WA results) in 2014, but I didn't include it on Wikipedia because I thought it was too "original research" as the AEC hadn't published any amended national totals (that I was aware of, it may be in some report somewhere). Your comment jogged my memory so I dug up the Excel file. By the way, there was some debate in 2014 about removing the 2013 WA results from the main article and the results lists entirely–I disagreed as the 2013 results were an artefact of the event even though they were voided. --Canley (talk) 11:27, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
 * All sounds good. If you want to do the post-2014 WA Senate table please feel free. It's clearly not WP:OR if the AEC are basing their swings off it. Timeshift (talk) 11:36, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I found a reference for the revised national totals in the AEC Electoral Pocketbook, so no OR problems! I'll do this later today. --Canley (talk) 01:45, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

OK, it is done. I have also made some changes to the original 2013 results table which was a strange mixture of the original and later results. The other votes number did not include the Sports Party so the total did not add up. The seat numbers were based on the later 2014 results, but the votes were the original 2013 ones. Here is the post-WA table:

--Canley (talk) 02:06, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

New state results articles
Not sure how many have seen the new 2016 election sidebar infobox yet, but aside from many outdated, missing or just plain wrong information in articles (to be expected at some level), it's a new way of doing it and I reckon it needs more eyes, discussion and ultimately consensus. I mean, how many editors think George Brandis and Penny Wong belong in an infobox for Australian federal election, 2016 (Northern Territory)? My 2c - I much prefer how we did it prior to 2016 - ie: Results of the Australian federal election, 2013 (House of Representatives). Timeshift (talk) 13:30, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * See the section titled "Template" above. My preference would also be for the state-by-state results tables and summaries without the commentary and infoboxes for each division. There is just too much content proposed:
 * Infoboxes for every seat (when the winner is clear from the results table anyway)
 * 500 or more words of commentary on each division (it's all written in the future tense so will need to be substantially re-written already). In NSW, only Banks and New England have a commentary at the moment so it is very unbalanced and I suspect no more will be done to fill in the gaps.
 * Seat-level polling was only done in some key marginals, and I thought was already included in the polling article.
 * The results tables will need to be updated and finalised, and this is being done piecemeal (and with several errors).
 * As I said above, if editors are willing and able to keep this enormous amount of content updated, then good luck—but I suspect this was over-ambitious and will not be expanded, updated or rewritten much further. I will produce the same state results tables as for 2013 when the AEC declares them final, I guess we can see then how these articles are progressing.
 * --Canley (talk) 14:10, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Sounds perfect Canley :) Timeshift (talk) 15:06, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Alright, so what do we want to do with these articles? I have started the results by state as per last election, but the Queensland one has just been tagged for speedy deletion as a duplicate of Australian federal election, 2016 (Queensland). Other than South Australia, none of them appear to have been updated after 3 August, and there is still the unbalanced aspect of Banks, Bass, Eden-Monaro and New England having large amounts of commentary text, which has not been done for other divisions.

The options are to overwrite the articles with the results-only lists, to create the results lists separately and redirect from the original articles to them (both of these retain the page history so the content can be retrieved; I would rather not delete them entirely. --Canley (talk) 12:05, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I think create them at "Results of ..." and redirect from the existing titles. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 13:11, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Non-classic divisions and the 10-week delay of the national 2PP result, 2CP, etc.
I expanded the 2PP note for much needed clarity. 2016 "non-classic" (2CP) seat link here - tried adding it as a ref within the note ref but wouldn't let me. Further... I viewed the last 500 edits to the previous election and found this from User:Canley to see how long it was between election day and the national 2PP calculated from all 150 electorates... based on what I could see it was 10 weeks, but the AEC link says last update was the start of November 2013, not end of November 2013. Thoughts? Timeshift (talk) 09:05, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I just had a look at the AEC Media Feed for the 2013 election, and they stopped the regular feed (updated every 15 minutes) on 12 November. They then did one more update on 27 November, which was to add the 2PP figures for the non-classic seats, which was what prompted me to check the 2PP by State page and see that it was marked as final. I don't know why the date says it was last updated 4 November. --Canley (talk) 10:09, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks User:Canley, do you have an URL for that 27 Nov 2013 update? Timeshift (talk) 11:18, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Here it is: ftp://results.aec.gov.au//17496/Standard/Light/aec-mediafeed-Standard-Light-17496-20131127195653.zip . To see all the updates go to ftp://results.aec.gov.au//17496/Standard/Light . --Canley (talk) 13:18, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Thank you... as I said I can't add a ref within a note ref so I won't add the link, but should it come under question this will be here. Thanks again! Timeshift (talk) 13:33, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Turnout figures don't quite match yet but AEC says all results declared and writs returned. All the 2PPs for the 2CP non-classic seats are out. Can someone add the 2CP to the 2PP in the 17 division result tables? Timeshift (talk) 08:25, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
 * The divisions where the 2PP count isn't complete are Maranoa (430 votes) and Wills (9,861 votes), but all the others can have the 2PP rows put in. --Canley (talk) 13:02, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Hmmm, as of this morning, the AEC VTR is now saying all results on the site are final, including the 2PP counts, although there is still a shortfall in the Maranoa and Wills totals. --Canley (talk) 05:18, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * AEC pushed out the final Wills 2PP on the afternoon of 23 August, Maranoa was last week some time. As in 2013, they didn't note it as an update on the Wills VTR page. I have added the final figures to the table and infobox. --Canley (talk) 00:52, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

Should Pauline Hanson/Pauline Hanson's One Nation be added to the infobox?
I prefer just the two government-forming parties to be included personally, however currently the status quo is that if a party has at least one seat in the lower house, they qualify to be added to the election article infobox. It seems to have worked reasonably ok until now, where we have KAP listed with one parliamentary seat, yet ONP with four parliamentary seats and arguably far more influential doesn't make the list. Should we add ONP to the infobox? Or should we revise the eligibility criteria? If the latter, please do try to also provide an opinion on the former, so if the latter doesn't progress we at least have input on the former? Timeshift (talk) 04:46, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I too think the two major parties only in the infobox works better, although I disagree that the Senate parties should be added. As the infobox currently stands, all parties in the lower house are included. Senators/their parties aren't added because they are irrelevant to who forms government. ONP and NXT may be influential in passing legislation, but they make no difference as to who forms government. ONP could have every seat in the Senate but that wouldn't make Pauline Hanson the Prime Minister, and I think in the context of this being an election article, only parties in the house which determines the government should be in the infobox, and that house is the lower house. -- Whats new?(talk) 05:43, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I hear other contributors often agree with just the two major party leaders, but it never seems to coalesce in to one RfC. Last attempt was here. If anyone wants to try again please be my guest! Timeshift (talk) 06:33, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
 * The infobox focuses on the HoR, and our current criterion is seats in the HoR, so no, One Nation should not go in (far more influential parties, like the Democrats, are also excluded, fairly in my view). The other one I saw proposed was party status, and One Nation would fail there too. As for the eligibilty criteria being changed, yawn. RfC if you must, but the constant needling on this from a small group of people is getting very tiresome. Frickeg (talk) 08:29, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Nice work so far with contribs, what left now? Maps?
Results of the Australian federal election, 2016 (House of Representatives) needs maps created and added, but apart from that, nice work everyone with being so timely at this election :) 07:09, 24 August 2016 (UTC)
 * There are some maps by Philip Terry Graham in commons:Category:Results of the Australian federal election, 2016: NSW, VIC, TAS, ACT, NT. Missing QLD, SA and WA. Barrylb was working on some as well, he posted some examples to get feedback on the colours, but I can't remember where. There's also Adam Carr's maps which were used last election. I can do the missing maps in Philip's style if I get some time after the NT election.--Canley (talk) 07:23, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

For now i've added NSW, Vic, Tas and the territories to Results of the Australian federal election, 2016 (House of Representatives). Hopefully it will encourage the last of the maps to come along. Timeshift (talk) 19:37, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia currently looking for new admins - apart from Canley do we have any other active ozpol admins? Nominate?
Apart from User:Canley who while good can't do it all, is there an easy way to see if there are any other active WikiProject Australian politics article watchers/contributors who are also admins? We could sure do with another admin! Wikipedia is currently accepting admin nominations at Requests for adminship. A user can nominate themselves or a user can nominate another user. To anyone interested, make sure you read Requests for adminship in full. If in doubt, ask familiar users and/or start an RfA candidate poll. Go for it! Timeshift (talk) 18:14, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm an admin too. Generally reasonably active as a contributor, and only sometimes as an admin. I'm curious why you seem to have posted this request at a few hours before you added an anti-admin box to your user page? --Scott Davis Talk 02:01, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I posted this as a response to a dispute I had a hour or two earlier. Following Nick-D's response here about agreeing needing more admins, I thought i'd just make it clear I myself do not want to be an admin as I far prefer to be an unshackled substantial contributor who doesn't mind getting in to the odd scrape to get the superior outcome. The coalface is where the magic happens :) Timeshift (talk) 02:09, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

What's the point of me being here?
I had contributed massive amounts of content to articles relating to the election this year. Unfortunately, I had become distracted by other projects, so I had to put a hold on my efforts to create new style election maps, new, actual articles to document elections in individual states and electorates rather than just a shitty bare-bones list of results, and to overall give the election a decent, informative, detailed amount of coverage like never before. My hopes was that an editor or two, or more, would help out in continuing efforts to build up these new articles in my absence, and if not, I would simply pick up where I left off when I eventually came back a month or two later. What I did not expect to find was all my hard work and progress purged. Hours, days and even weeks of effort, gone. All the contributions I made, all the material I built, vanished. All the election maps I drew up, nowhere to be seen. All the articles I had been building, reduced to becoming those horror "list articles" once again. To add even more insult to injury, some of the evidence to prove my hard work has been purged from edit histories as well, as is the case with Results of the Australian federal election, 2016 (Tasmania). I had built up an entire article, complete with a background, details for one of the five electorates, with the other four yet to be completed, details for the senate, all with proper citations and results up to date as of my last edit. Now I have nothing to prove it even existed. Thankfully, Results of the Australian federal election, 2016 (New South Wales) was not purged of its edit history, so I could at least see one of the people behind this.

I found to be one of the culprits - his edit, which deleted a horrifically sinful 42,230 bytes, something that should never happen unless it was a reversion of a huge vandal edit, or a similar situation, had a summary stating "replaced with contents from results list – see Talk:Australian federal election, 2016 – very outdated and unbalanced (content-wise, not POV)". To my disappointment, I came to find on this talk page, under a section entitled "New state results articles", discussing these articles as being bad and somehow worse than the previous articles that were just lists instead of actual, informative articles, and Canley spitting out words of non-effort like "there is just too much content proposed" and "I suspect no more will be done to fill in the gaps", and proposing that taking no effort and just purging the articles for the sake of not having to put any effort is somehow better than putting any effort.

Now, I know what you're probably thinking at this point - "hey, you should calm down a bit, man." And to that I say, no. I have every fucking right to be furious and unforgiving towards you guys, because the thing that made me enraged the most is that none of you people fucking bothered to do the simple thing and actually goddamn tell me that you were having a discussion on this. Not a, nor even a goddamn message on my talk page! I would've been more than happy to talk to you guys about this and discuss my contributions and how we should progress with them in a straightforward, constructive manner. It is absolute editorial rape that you would go ahead, not invite me to discussion, talk shit about my edits behind my back and purge everything I've done for these articles without me even knowing about it until weeks after the fact. It is absolutely fucking disgusting. What have I ever done to you guys to deserve this kind of horrible treatment? All I did was just introduce some new ideas into these articles and you do this to me? What is even the point of contributing to these articles if this is how you actually, literally treat your fellow editors?

As of this post, I'm pulling by support for the WikiProject Australian politics. It's obvious that my contributions aren't appreciated, nor is there really any point of my being here. I hope these articles stay in their crappy state, and continue to be a terrible resource for people trying to research contemporary Australian politics and elections. Philip Terry Graham 15:27, 29 August 2016 (UTC)


 * The Tasmanian page was a mess - it was created without any discussion with other editors, was out of date following the election, used a muddle of tables not fitting in with how they're used everywhere else on the project, and the one seat that had a detailed attempt at prose was not a particularly good attempt. (I am generally in favour of developing seat-level election coverage, but that shows the pitfalls, splurging irrelevant asides in the press into paragraphs of text.) You introduced some not very good ideas, tried implementing drastic changes without consultation but could only be bothered writing them for one seat, abandoned them at the time of the post-election cleanup, and editors dealt with it and moved on. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 02:10, 30 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the offence caused to you, and yes I'm sorry, I should have advised you directly on your talk page or pinged you in one of the several discussions about the content. My comments were meant to be constructive, not insulting, and if you read them I'm sure I emphasised that I believed they were started with the best of intentions, but were overambitious and unlikely to be finished in a timely fashion—which seems to be exactly what happened. That said, if you were going to be too busy to continue post-election, or wanted assistance from other editors to continue the development of the articles, then you should have said something on one of the related talk pages. The edit history is still intact for all of them if you go back from the redirect (for example, the Tasmania page) so no content should be irretrievable and I can restore it if it is. Regarding the maps, I did raise the topic on the talk page if you recall and was very impressed with your maps, but as with the state-by-state articles you said you were too busy to do NSW for a while, and Barrylb had an automated way to produce a consistent set of maps for all divisions. --Canley (talk) 03:22, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * In the previous discussion you refer to, you'll notice I specifically did not want to delete any of the content so that it could be retrieved and worked on if you returned. As you have stated, you have been so offended by these discussions and actions that you are unlikely to do so—that's understandable and I apologise again. If you do wish to return and continue, I can revert the page move on the NSW article so you can restore the page history. But please discuss your plans and intended scope of such large-scale projects here or at the Auspol talk page—and understand that while our, specifically my, communication with you was lacking, it has been the other way round as well. Discussion and consensus are the cornerstones of the project, and if you do decide to re-engage with the Australian politics project, you will certainly be welcome, but I would implore you to discuss and engage with other editors in a collaborative fashion and we will do the same. --Canley (talk) 04:03, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * By the way, just so you know, I have also spent "hours, days and weeks" on what you call "shitty bare-bones lists of results", and maps as well. "Horror list articles" they may be to you, but they were updated regularly, accurately and consistently, whereas these were moved from your user space on the day of the election, and then essentially abandoned while you apparently expected other editors to pick up the slack and keep them up to date without even asking them. If you were only going to create prose for 4 or 5 divisions out of 150 and then go back to work on them two months after the election, you should have kept them in your user space and asked for assistance or feedback rather than placing what was essentially a barely-started draft into the public space, and then cracking it because you don't understand how redirects and deletion work, or can't be bothered keeping an eye on talk pages or watchlists. I was constructive about my comments on the articles, certainly not stooping to the invective you have heaped on my and others' work in your anger, so it's unfortunate that you were so offended by what I intended as helpful technical and content advice which I assumed (incorrectly) you would see and take on board. Also see above in 's "What now?" post, where I specifically recommend using your maps in the national results summaries as the best ones available, and offering to reproduce your map style myself to fill in maps of missing ones like QLD, SA, WA in case you didn't return, rather than the "no effort" responses you accuse me of. --Canley (talk) 07:39, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Not really involved here, but I just want to put on the record that Canley has done the lion's share of the work with updating everything post-election, and does not deserve the invective heaped upon them one bit. PTG, while pinging is courteous, it is not required, and if you can't be bothered to check your watchlist then it's not other people's responsibility to keep you up to date on mainspace pages. I understand you're upset, and I actually liked some of your ideas, but the huge rant above, in response to editing that was not even slightly malicious, is so over-the-top that any legitimate points you might have are totally drowned out. I mean, "editorial rape"? Yeah, you do need to calm down. Frickeg (talk) 08:17, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

Again with the media incorrectly leaving the Greens out of the Senate crossbench tally...!
The damn lot of them this time! Can I please ask a favour? Can we please where possible not reference news articles which incorrectly refer to an 11 member Senate crossbench? The Greens are not part of the government or the opposition, they are indisputably crossbenchers too. The media as a whole are just plain hopeless with facts now if this is anything to go by. We have again elected a new record number of crossbenchers - a full 20 this time, compared to the then-record of 18 at the last election. Timeshift (talk) 03:15, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * There is an increasing tendency to treat the Greens as a major party. I don't think this is really justified just yet, but I guess they're definitely in a different category to, say, the Lib Dems, or even NXT or One Nation. Still, with you completely on this point - they're still crossbenchers. Frickeg (talk) 03:24, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Whether a party is micro, minor or major has no meaning here. The Liberal/National Coalition with the largest number of lower house seats are the government, and Labor with the second-largest number of lower house seats are Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition. Any and all other parties and/or members are therefore automatically crossbenchers by definition. I acknowledge you agree with what i'm saying, but I can't help but feel your first sentence somehow assists political illiterates in coming to their false crossbench conclusions... Timeshift (talk) 03:38, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I didn't really look for whether the articles I was referencing gave a total size to the crossbench. I was looking for candidate names in secondary sources, as the vtr.aec website will likely be closed down fairly shortly. I almost cited New Matilda] as it had the information I wanted. I note now that article does not ascribe a size to the crossbench, so doesn't say if it thinks the Greens are on it. --Scott Davis Talk 04:01, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * VTR will be there for a while yet, and once it does get taken down it's just a matter of updating to whatever the AEC elections link is, ie: 2013 results. I assume you didn't end up citing New Matilda as WP:RS is doubtful? I know you didn't look for whether articles/potential refs referred to a crossbench size as it's not what you were attempting to cite - which is why I raised my concern and request here for you and others to see. Surely there's a mutually acceptable WP:RS out there that doesn't refer to a patently incorrect 11-member crossbench - if not, what a sorry state of affairs...! When we use sources that contain blatant errors, for many readers it would call in to question our collective ability to ensure refs we use are factually correct, regardless of whether it's relevant to what it's citing. Timeshift (talk) 04:22, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

No matter how much I search, it seems not a single media outlet is reporting the correct number of 20 crossbenchers - not a single article anywhere I can find... it seems such a basic concept has failed every last publishing journalist. This experience was sort of similar at the last election, but this time around it seems each and every last one is united in the same ignorance and factual inaccuracy, despite what should really be a simple cut and dry undisputed fact. Is it really possible that they are all coincidentally getting it wrong, or are they feeding off each other, or is it a conspiracy to make the Greens appear irrelevant? Any (or more than one) of these being the case wouldn't surprise me either way. What a sad example of the ever-lower depths of today's journalism quality, or lack-thereof. Even disregarding the subject of this issue, it comes down to the general principle that if they cant get the basics right, what hope do they have of accurately reporting more complex issues? Sad times for Australia when the most basic of electoral facts fail the entire fourth estate. Will it fall upon aph.gov.au to report the numbers correctly as they have done previously? Timeshift (talk) 05:06, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

Ha, how ironic. Just came across this australianpolitics.com article who besides wikipedia is the only other source (so far, but still just one out of many) to report the crossbench numbers correctly - yet they're not considered WP:RS, while all the media outlets getting it wrong are considered WP:RS! Timeshift (talk) 05:36, 4 August 2016 (UTC)


 * "... or is it a conspiracy to make the Greens appear irrelevant?" - au contraire, mon vieux. It looks like they're trying to make the Greens appear relevant.  I can sort of see where their thinking is coming from.  "Crossbenchers" seems to have 2 meanings - (a) the technical definition you provided above, i.e. anyone who is neither government nor opposition; and (b) smaller parties, groups and independents who do not have official party status.  The Greens belong to definition (a) but not to (b). I of course support definition (a) for our purposes here, but the media seems to generally use (b) because it's in their interests to promote stories with drama and uncertainty, tension and crisis, and if the Greens are regarded as "major players", which they undoubtedly are, then it makes for a better story to talk about the government, the opposition, the Greens and all the others.  In other words, they separate the Greens out from the others, while we include them.  I agree it's a misuse of the term "crossbencher" to separate them, but it is what it is. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  10:00, 4 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Turnbull considers Greens crossbench, "there were 18 crossbench senators in the old Senate..." . This from Adelaide "The new chamber will include a diverse crossbench, including members of the Nick Xenophon Team, Greens and One Nation." . This per aph site as mentioned by Timeshift above "From 1 July 2015 until its dissolution on 9 May 2016, the Senate had its largest-ever crossbench, of 18 senators". I don't know why journos insist on 'forgetting' Greens. Is it up to wp editors to keep the bastards honest? JennyOz (talk) 11:04, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, it is. Journos have a way of using language that tries to be creative, attention-grabbing etc, but sometimes turns out to be plain sloppy, misleading, inaccurate and wrong.  Witness how they refer to a politician's office in his home base as his "electoral" office.  Well, no.  The "electoral office" is the AEC.  A politician's office is his "electorate" office.  Their approach seems to be: "small details like this are pernickety, trivial, pedantic, hair-splitting, they don't matter, and our readers are not interested". How terribly wrong-headed that philosophy is. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  22:25, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

... "will have to negotiate with 20 crossbenchers"... - about time, thank you! Surprise surprise it was the ABC, not News Ltd, that eventually got it right first. Timeshift (talk) 11:37, 31 August 2016 (UTC)

Senate chart image has speaker square but HoR's doesn't, pls fix
has speaker square but doesn't. Pls fix. Timeshift (talk) 08:15, 8 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I've done it, but have you seen this wonderful tool to easily generate these seating diagrams? --Canley (talk) 02:26, 18 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Ooh no I haven't, great find! Timeshift (talk) 07:59, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

vtr.aec.gov.au taken down, links need updating
It's at that point of the cycle again where the vtr.aec.gov.au Virtual Tally Room website has been taken down, so there are now many, many outdated references all over wikipedia pointing to vtr, that need to be changed to the correct link at http://results.aec.gov.au/20499/Website/HouseDefault-20499.htm - does anyone want to go through all articles including all 150 divisions? Timeshift (talk) 07:59, 19 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Yep, I knew it was about to happen so I've got the files ready to do it! Should be all done tonight. --Canley (talk) 09:41, 19 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Cheers! Timeshift (talk) 11:13, 19 September 2016 (UTC)