Proportional Representation Society of Australia Inc.
	Tel +61429176725	info@prsa.org.au	www.prsa.org.au	2025-01-05

The Hare-Clark system of proportional representation
OFFICIAL DESCRIPTIONS	The Hare-Clark electoral system is described on the websites of  the Electoral Commissions of Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory. It became the electoral system for all Tasmania's lower house seats in 1907, and the Australian Capital Territory's system in 1992. Both of those systems remain. Tasmania's Hare-Clark system for its House of Assembly is the electoral system that has been the longest continually in force in Australia. See a critical look at it, and the Tasmanian Electoral Commission's brief video on it.
DIRECT ELECTION	Hare-Clark is a system of Proportional Representation using the single transferable vote (PR-STV) that, unlike other PR systems, implements the vital principle of DIRECT ELECTION of representatives.
NEED TO FILL AN ODD NUMBER OF PLACES	PR-STV should be used to fill an ODD - not an even number of places - to ensure that a majority of places will be filled by a bare absolute majority of the votes, avoiding a stalemate where two groups of representatives of equal numbers can be elected, which is impossible if the overall number is an ODD number.
ROBSON ROTATION	Robson Rotation governs printing of candidates' names on ballot-papers so that no candidate has more or less chance of being in a more prominent position on a ballot-paper than any other candidate, thus neutralizing "donkey votes", and making Australia's widespread use of political parties' self-serving "how-to-vote" cards ineffective.
PARTIAL OPTIONAL MARKING OF PREFERENCES	Partial optional marking of preferences has always applied in Hare-Clark, so those preferences beyond the small number of positions to be filled may be marked, but do not have to be marked, for a ballot to be valid. Tasmania's Parliament and the A.C.T. have declined to adopt above-the-line voting with its associated Group Voting Tickets, which once distorted representation in the PR systems in all other Australian legislatures, but such contrivances have now been discontinued in all States except Victoria. The Senate PR-STV system had - without any good public interest reason - controversially required, until 2016, nearly all preferences to be marked for a valid below-the-line vote. In the 2013 election of six senators for New South Wales, a record 110 candidates stood, requiring - quite unreasonably - a below-the-line voter to correctly mark 99 preferences for his or her ballot to be valid.
DROOP QUOTA	It is the Droop quota, rather than the Hare quota originally put forward by Thomas Hare, that is used in the Hare-Clark system, as in virtually all modern systems of proportional representation using the single transferable vote (PR-STV), because it avoids some of the practical disadvantages of the Hare quota.
GREGORY FRACTIONAL TRANSFER	Gregory fractional transfer is the system of transferring surplus votes by examining all relevant ballot papers prescribed, and transferring a fractional part of their vote value to the candidate indicated as the next available preference. The Tasmanian and ACT Hare-Clark systems would be improved if that original Gregory fractional transfer were replaced with the fairer Weighted Inclusive Gregory fractional transfer used for Western Australia's Legislative Council.
COUNTBACK	Countback ensures, unlike the undemocratic system of replacement of directly elected senators by party appointees still used for the Senate and all of mainland Australia's Upper Houses except that of Western Australia, that the people that fill casual vacancies under the Hare-Clark system are directly elected by the voters. It has been part of Tasmania's Hare-Clark system since 1918.
ENTRENCHMENT	In Tasmania, the Hare-Clark system ought to be entrenched against opportunistic repeal, as it is in the Australian Capital Territory, and should be wherever it is adopted. Further information on Hare-Clark appears in the Tasmanian and the Australian Capital Territory sections of The Growth and Success of PR-STV (quota-preferential) Systems. Click here for HOME.