“Contesting the Hare-Clark electoral system is very challenging for lone independents. Hence the drive to form small parties,” writes political columnist and small-party survivor MICHAEL MOORE.  

JUST a little over a year out from the 2024 ACT election the electoral commission has announced its intention to cancel the registration of two small political parties. 

Apparently, these parties have not retained more than 100 members. Unless they can demonstrate the appropriate number of party members, the ACT Electoral Commission is bound to remove their registration.

But why register small parties in the first place? Why not just run as independents with no affiliation and no bureaucratic need to develop rules and maintain membership.

Small parties have been a feature of ACT elections since the first election in 1989 and, no doubt, small new political parties will continue to be developed and play a role. Contesting the Hare-Clark electoral system is very challenging for lone independents. Hence the drive to form small parties.

Lone independents are invariably relegated to a list of random independents. They are referred to as “ungrouped”. When a small party is formed the candidates have both a position that the party presents and their own profile.

The courage in standing for an election is not to be dismissed lightly. Our democracy works most effectively when people put up their hand to stand up for what they believe. However, the most effective political campaigns for novel parties marry an issue with a candidate who already has a profile. Preferably, this is a candidate who is understood to be already associated with the specific subject.

The proposed deregistration of the Small Business Australian Capital Territory party highlights a key issue in considering voting for small parties. 

In June the party changed its name from the Australian Federation Party Australian Capital Territory. There is practically no information to be found regarding the new Small Business Party.

However, it provides an important lesson to learn about small parties. The Federation Party (now renamed for the ACT and up for deregistration) is a populist party. The change of name was probably designed to have much more appeal in the ACT. The Federation Party website starts with: “Australia has never suffered more devastating decisions than the disproportionate ‘public health’ policies of 2020, 2021 and 2022”.

The tone is set with: “Basic freedoms have been wiped out, small businesses have been destroyed, and the state’s extensions now permeate every element of our society”. 

In reading this, I picture the extremists with their Eureka flags who came to Canberra during the pandemic and demonstrated against the government, against action on the pandemic and against vaccination.

The “Position Statement” of the party reflects the sort of information that was on the posters of those demonstrators. It is anti-abortion, pro-Judeo-Christian values including funding Christian chaplains in our schools, and ensuring the Christian heritage of the nation remains “a central element of understanding our core values”. Health is not included in the other 10 policies of the party.

At the last election the party, which received just 600 votes in each of two electorates, had just three candidates: Jason Potter and Scott Sandford in Brindabella, and Mohammad Hussain in Yerrabi.

It is difficult to find current information about the Climate Justice Party. The main site has been discontinued. This party, which is also up for deregistration, scored around 600 votes in each of the electorates in which they stood candidates. They did not field candidates in Brindabella.

Twelve candidates were fielded in electorates other than Brindabella or Yerrabi. They scored close to 200 primary votes each on average. 

The candidates were Oksana Demetrios, Sok Kheng Ngep, Jonathan Stavridis, Sophia Forner, Petar Johnson, Alix O’Hara, Rohan Byrnes, Andrew Demetrios, Richard Forner, Jackson Hillman and Peter Veenstra.

Votes were fairly evenly distributed indicating largely random voting for the party. The impact of the Robson Rotation means that “party votes” are evenly distributed between the candidates.

Even if these parties are also deregistered, small parties will continue to play a key part in ACT elections. Subject to deregistration, there will be 12 parties in the ACT.

These, and probably others, will continue to challenge the dominance of the Labor, Liberals and, to a lesser extent, the Greens. Those who put up their hands are contributing to a lively democracy. No matter what they believe, or how many votes they eventually get, Canberrans should thank them for their contribution.

Michael Moore is a former member of the ACT Legislative Assembly and an independent minister for health. He has been a political columnist with “CityNews” since 2006.