Who are the Pirate Party preferencing?

With all the attention on this year’s election has been on Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott, it’s easy to forget that there is also a Senate election. Yesterday, we covered what parties will receive your vote if you vote for the Wikileaks Party in this year’s Senate election. Today, we’re covering the Pirate Party.

The Pirate Party has opted to do something differently when selecting their preferences for parties – they actually asked its members, not have some committee do it. They asked all parties to give them reasons why they should have the Pirate Party preferenced them. Out of all the parties that are in Parliament, the Greens were the only ones to respond.

Then their members had three days to vote on the order of preferences. Of course, deals were made before the actual results were done – but which parties were based on results prior of closing the preferences ballot. The Pirate Party did a “reciprocal” preference deal with The Greens, the Sex Party and the Wikileaks Party – basically meaning that whatever position they placed the Pirate Party, that would be the position the Pirate Party will place them. That is why you can see the Greens offering second preference to the Pirate Party in both NSW and Tasmania (and vice versa).

It should be noted that there is no deal with the Australian Democrats – despite their unusually high positions in the preference order. This was because, according to the Pirate Party, they believed they were negotiating with the Democrats but their contact did not represent the official party.

“The reciprocation deal between the Pirate Party and the Australian Democrats is considered null and void,” the Pirate Party said in a statement.

It appears since last year, the Australian Democrats have faced a bitter internal fight – with now two parties claiming to be the official party. According to Crikey, this fight was sparked by the resignation of a national secretary last year and the appointment of Darren Churchill as his replacement. Churchill is in charge the AEC-recognised Australian Democrats, while 21-year-old Hayden Ostrom Brown is the national secretary of the ‘Australian Democrats’ that the Pirate Party were negotiating with.

The Pirate Party have referred the matter to the Australian Electoral Commission.

You can see the preferences order in full on their website – and they pretty much align with what the actual preferences listed below (with some changes due to preference deals).

Victoria

There isn’t anything particular abnormal about its preferences in Victoria, only that a 3-on-3 preference deal with it and Wikileaks has turned out very favourable to the Pirate Party (they’re on number two, as opposed to number 3, on the Wikileaks Party’s preference sheet). The Australian Democrats are their number two – but as stated above, the deal was negotiated with a party claiming to be the Democrats and not the official party themselves.

New South Wales

The Pirate Party’s preferences in New South Wales are interesting for a number of reasons. Firstly, their preferencing of Labor candidates. While they are 30th in the Pirate Party preferences, they have opted to give their number one party pick to Doug Cameron instead of Bob Carr (who is number one on the party list). Carr is preferenced last in the party list on the Pirate Party sheets.

Another interesting choice is splitting the Nationals and Liberals. All the Nationals Senate candidates have been preferenced before their Liberals counterpart (and in party list order). Also preferenced before Liberal are the Shooters and Fishers Party. All Liberal preferences are in party list order.

Queensland

Like Victoria, the preferences are just ordinary. The Greens are their number three party, while the Australian Democrats are number two. As mentioned above, the Australian Democrats prime position was because of negotiations on what the Pirate Party thought were the real Australian Democrats.

Tasmania

Like New South Wales, the Greens are their number two party. Shooters and Fishers, which in the previous lists have been preferenced after the Liberals/Nationals, have been preferenced just before the Liberals in Tasmania.