After the 2010 election, independent crossbenchers negotiated for 17 days with Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to decide who to support.

Almost two years after the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) began operations, it is at a crossroads. 

Election campaigns come and go, but some go faster than others.

It’s widely predicted that Saturday’s federal election will be decided by voters feeling the cost-of-living squeeze in the outer suburbs of our capital cities.

The white men in the White House are trying to radically reshape modern America.

Last election, independent Kylea Tink won the seat of North Sydney on a primary vote of 25%.

New polling research by The Australia Institute reveals that 86% of Australians want stronger legal protections for whistleblowers.

Australians are rightfully proud of compulsory voting, which ensures widespread participation in elections.

Complaints about the brevity of three-year parliamentary terms are common in Australia.

The United States is disappearing down an authoritarian rabbit hole and Australian leaders are struggling to respond.

A cornerstone of the Australian election experience is tucking into a democracy sausage after casting your ballot on election day.

A number of the housing policy proposals on offer in this election will make affordability worse.

Every Australian parliament – federal, state and territory – has had a speaker from a party other than the one in government at some point.

Amy Remeikis and Bill Browne discuss the federal election campaign so far, the performance of the media, and how preferential voting actually works.

Sky News says community independent MP Allegra Spender supports more Coalition motions than Greens motions. But They Vote for You says Spender votes with Greens MPs more often than Coalition MPs. That both those claims are made about the same person is proof that voting comparisons are fraught. It is just as confusing when it

For many journalists, the past – specifically the past before 1945 – is a foreign country. Election coverage is replete with references to “firsts” or “milestones” that assume that Australian history began in the post-war period. But a longer view would help us better understand the political processes around us. Journalists described the 2010 federal

In the 2022 election, the count in the seat of Brisbane was on a knife edge.

Today the AEC promised “bingo cages, blindfolds and balls” – in other words, they finalised the candidates for the upcoming federal election, and randomly decided which order they will be displayed on the ballot paper.

Independent MPs are not new to Australian politics.

It’s chaos out there.

The Australia Institute, The Centre for Public Integrity, the Australian Democracy Network and Transparency International Australia have come together to identify six key reforms to redress the unfairness created by the Commonwealth’s new political finance laws, and make real progress on combatting the influence of vested interests on the exercise of public power.

It’s funny that we call single-party government “majority” government, because no one party or coalition has won a majority of the first-preference or primary vote since 1975.

In the 2025 Australian election there will be about 120,000 registered voters per elected MP.

Robust debate is better than mealy-mouthed bipartisanship. Televised leaders’ debates can be a good thing if they illustrate the choices facing voters.

Sometimes parties part ways with their candidates.

Media analysis shows that the decade from 2007 was the bellwether era, but that era has now passed

A competitive and diverse news industry is key to a democratic society, keeping institutions accountable and transparent. But the ability of Australia’s Fourth Estate to perform that role is increasingly in doubt. Australia was once labelled the “land of the newspaper” by British visitors, with a flourishing and diverse news industry, but for over a

Labor says it will push to double the number of senators for the ACT if re-elected. Finance Minister Katy Gallagher told ABC Canberra: “it’s certainly something we all support”.

New research by The Australia Institute has found the slow death of newspapers in Australia has led to a plunge in media diversity and local storytelling.

Full preferential voting is a proud Coalition reform – one that benefits every political persuasion Compulsory voting and full preferential voting make up the backbone of Australian democracy, and protect us from voter suppression and disengagement seen in other countries. We owe both to the parties of the centre-right, what would become the Liberal–National Coalition.