Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Section 282 Commonwealth Electoral Act


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete.  Sandstein  12:25, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

Section 282 Commonwealth Electoral Act

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A bunch of semi-incoherent bullet points on a non-notable subject. The Drover&#39;s Wife (talk) 04:34, 29 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 04:38, 29 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 04:38, 29 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete. I agree that this is a bunch of semi-incoherent bullet points. It may be on a notable subject, but if it is notable, it should be covered in an article about the broader topic of Australian Senate elections rather than just about this one section of the law. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:43, 29 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete. The bullet points appear to be an attempt to complain about the 2016 non-application of the section without any background explanation. A more coherent (but arguably still disproportionate) bullet point has been added to Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 by the same user that created this page.  A briefer mention in that article would be justified, and also possibly in Double dissolution. -- Alaric004 (talk) 06:36, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

It is still under construction, hence the bullet points. I expect it will be too big for a section on the CEA page. I have expanded the article with some background already. This is going to have legislative outcomes, and I expect we will have a referendum on it some time in the next decade if it is not resolved prior to 2019.

Do we have a broader article about Australian Senate elections? Scott Davis has also suggested an alternative place to host it, but the title he suggested seems a bit cumbersome. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Oz freediver (talk • contribs) 08:58, 29 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete. The Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 article has a small section about a range of amendments in 1984 including this one. The section should be expanded to show all that changed. --Scott Davis Talk 09:09, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

I have added a lot of material. Hopefully that is enough to show it should not be deleted, and also that it is too big for a subsection of the CEA article. I realise it still needs citations, some more detail in certain areas and the text doesn't flow well. It won't happen overnight, but it will happen. I am still open to finding it a new home, but I do not prefer any of the alternatives suggested so far.

To whoever makes this decision, please note that there are a lot of vested interests in keeping this quiet. The various media outlets do not want to advertise the fact that their incompetence was so beneficial to the major parties on this issue. The major parties are still benefiting from this and could have a tough 3 years ahead of them if more people find out key facts, such as the 1998 and 2010 bipartisan Senate resolutions that destroy any legitimacy in what they did. I expect this will become a campaign issue in three years time, and we will eventually have a referendum on it. Allowing whoever controls the Senate to pick and choose the method that hands them a few extra seats every time we have a DD election is not a viable outcome. How anyone could describe this as 'non-notable' is ludicrous.

I think that this is the reason for some of the unusual justifications put forward. Drover for example nominated the article for speedy deletion. In justifying this, he acknowledged that it does not meet any of the criteria for speedy deletion. He invented a criteria - 'unremarkable' and 'part of a massive piece of legislation'. Are these the invisible sixth pillar of wikipedia? I see the same here: 'non-notable,' 'disproportionate' etc. I think people are not being entirely honest here. If you are not honest with yourself about how you feel, your emotions will control you, and your actions will appear inconsistent and irrational. It is OK to feel annoyed or angry about this, but it will never get resolved if you do not say what is really bothering you. Our democracy is important. You are not powerless to make this right. Oz freediver (talk) 22:04, 30 September 2016 (UTC)


 * if there was a "controversy" surrounding the 2016 election, we have a number of articles relating specifically to that election that should cover any controversy. There is an article on the senate for general stuff about the senate that could include history of how long and short terms have been allocated every time the entire senate has been elected (including the first). There is an article on the Electoral commission and an article on the electoral act with a section for each major set of amendments, and this section appears to have been introduced or changed in the 1984 amendments. The content currently in this article would need a lot more citation and reduced bias to be acceptable. I've removed the worst of the fluff a few times, and noted some areas that need references. --Scott Davis Talk 22:17, 1 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I accept the point about citations, and am happy to work on making it appropriately neutral. I think the facts speak for themselves. You asked for a citation on this particular comment "However, in the 2016 election, in all of the six states, all six full term seats were allocated under the order-elected method prior to any Senate candidate being excluded from the ballot (and having their preferences distributed). The Australian has since made their article inaccessible." I assume you want a reference to the seat allocation procedure, not to my inability to access the article on the original website. The only website I am aware of that explains this clearly is my own, but I understand I am not allowed to link to, as that would be a conflict of interest. You can sort of figure it out from the wikipedia article on the Senate results, but only if you do the maths and know how to interpret the info there. I can't imagine they would be happy if I started rearranging their tables of results to prove this point. Oz freediver (talk) 03:02, 2 October 2016 (UTC)
 * It needs either the full citation to a newspaper article (many libraries would have one), or a citation to the claim that News Corp/The Australian has completely eradicated an article that described it, if that is relevant to the topic. Hansard is a primary source, but would definitely describe the decision about the allocation, and it is likely that all major news papers and web sites would have reported on it. But that is relevant to the 2016 election in particular, not in general to the clause in the act that offers an alternative allocation method that was not used. --Scott Davis Talk 12:56, 2 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete. Yeah, waaay too specific. Should be able to be covered quite adequately on the Electoral Act page. The creator might want to read WP:NPOV - it's fine to have strong opinions about this (I have them myself), but not fine to edit with the goal of pushing a point of view. Frickeg (talk) 06:16, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

I wasn't aware that wikipedia pages were supposed to avoid being 'too specific'. Is there some rule that no-one is telling me about?

I am also not aware of any rules covering people's goals or motivations for contributing here. As far as I know the rules only cover the content submitted. Oz freediver (talk) 06:58, 1 October 2016 (UTC)


 * There is no rule about goals or motivations, but there is WP:NPOV about the tone of the content. --Scott Davis Talk 22:17, 1 October 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.