A PREFERENTIAL VOTING BILL.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3297, 16 August 1911, Page 3

A PREFERENTIAL VOTING BILL.

BEFORE VICTORIA STATE PARLIAMENT.

The Bill making provision for the adoption of preferential voting on the compulsory principle, which was introduced in the Legislative Assembly, provides that when at any election a person receives a ballot paper, instead of striking out the name of any candidate for whom he does_ not intend to vote, he shall mark his vote on the ballot paper by placing the numeral 1 opposite the name of the candidate for whom he votes as liis first preference, and shall give contingent votes for all the remaining candidates by placing numerals 2,3, 4 and so on, according as the number of candidates may require, opposite their names, so as to indicate by such numerical sequence the order of his preference. The candidate opposite whose name the numeral 1 is so placed shall be deemed to be the candidate to whom the elector gives his vote. A ballot paper shall under this act be rejected at the close of the poll it it does not indicate the elector’s first preference for one candidate, and his contingent votes for all the remaining candidates. The candidate who has received the greatest number of first preference votes shall, if such number constitutes an absolute majority of votes, be declared duly elected. If no candidate shall have an absolute majority, the lowest candidate on the list shall be struck out. and his votes shall be distributed among the other candidates in order of the voters’, preference. This process is to be continued until one of the candidates secures an absolute majority of the votes. By way of illustration, in a contest in which there were three candidates, the ballot paper mar be marked—• smith ..: 1 BROWN 2 JONES ... 3 If the first preference votes cast for Smith constituted a clear majority of the entire number of votes polled", he would bo elected. But if he failed to get a. majority, the candidate with the lowest number of first preferences would be taken out of the contest and his papers would be allotted to the two remaining candidates, according to the voters’ preference, and the candidate who then secured the majority would win the scat. _ If there were, say, half a dozen, candidates, the process of exhaustion would be carried on until one of them had obtained a majority of tho total number of votes cast.