In 2004 I watched as the preferences from Labor and the Democrats helped elect Steve Fielding. It got me thinking: why don’t more people vote below the line?

The answer is obvious: it’s a pain in the a-se. Given there are up to 84 boxes to number — granted, you’re allowed a few mistakes — it’s still time-consuming and annoying.  It’s far easier to assume that your party of choice will be doing the right thing and stick that 1 above the line.

But the party in question may be playing games with its preference flows that lead to someone you didn’t want getting elected.

The Group Voting Tickets were released last weekend. For those who aren’t election tragics, these are the preference tickets lodged by the parties or groups of candidates that are used when you vote above the line.

One thing you may not realise is that they’re allowed to file up to three of them. This can lead to amusing preference splits — such as Crikey founder Stephen Mayne splitting his preferences between Family First and the Greens, or the Socialist Equality Party who try to come as close to a zero-sum preference flow as possible by putting themselves first and then immediately splitting between Labor, the Coalition and the Greens with the rest of the ballot pretty much a donkey vote.

Then there’s the Democrats in the ACT, who are shaping up as this election’s Victorian ALP by sending their preferences straight to the Liberals ahead of  Labor and the Greens.

My biggest problem with the system as it currently stands is that the parties and the candidates are free to lodge preference flows that can run counter to what large sections of their supporters may expect. It’s up to the voter to ask for the book at the polling place and check there aren’t any nasty surprises lurking in their above-the-line vote.

If they’re a bit more aware they could go to the AEC site and download the PDF copies of the preference booklets, but they’re just as hard to follow so they only thing you’re gaining is extra time in which to try and piece together what’s going on.

So I decided to try and do something about it.

First, I thought, we need to rearrange the preference flow into a linear order that a human can read.  Antony Green’s done this as well.  What I wanted to do was allow people to remake the preference flow so as to actually reference their, y’know, preference. Lastly, this flow should be able to be printed in a simple form that could be taken in to the polling booth with them to make voting below the line as easy as possible.

The result is www.belowtheline.org.au. I hope you find it useful.