Australia has a politician problem: not too many, but too few

By contrast, in 1903 there were just 25,000 voters per MP (this being the first election where most women could vote).

In the intervening 122 years, the federal parliament has significantly expanded twice: from 74 to 121 seats in 1949, and from 125 to 148 in 1984. Both times, the number of people per seat sat at a then record high: 64,000 and 75,000 respectively.

Voting rights have also expanded: women’s suffrage came in 1903 (though not for all women), Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voting rights took until 1963, and the voting age was lowered from 21 to 18 in 1974.

But while there are nine times as many registered voters today as in 1903, the number of electorates has only doubled.

As the number of voters per MP grows, the access any individual voter will have to their member necessarily decreases – Australia Institute polling research in 2022 found that only 15% of Australians had ever spoken to their local MP (and only 36% knew their name).

And the more voters there are in an electorate, the larger a campaign needs to be to make any difference to the result, giving communities less power to kick out an unrepresentative or under-performing MP.

Australia is a lot bigger and more complicated than it was fifty or a hundred years ago. Australia’s first government, the Barton Ministry, had 10 ministers while Albanese’s first Ministry had 30 (plus 12 assistant ministers). That leaves fewer backbenchers to do important committee work and means a smaller talent pool from which to choose government ministers.

Australia has far fewer representatives per person on a federal level than in states and territories. Each member of NSW’s Legislative Assembly represents just under 60,000 voters, half as many as a federal MP. Each Northern Territory MLA represents just 6,000 people. Tasmania has recently expanded its parliament, reducing the number of voters per seat from almost 16,000 to under 12,000.

Perhaps having more local representation is one reason why Australians think state and territory governments better reflect the interests and needs of the community than the Commonwealth?

Australia’s MP-voter ratio is also low by international standards. Canada, the UK, France and Germany all have more representation than Australia. New Zealand has one MP for every 30,000 voters: four times Australia’s ratio.

Are we really okay with the Kiwis showing us up on democracy?

According to recent polling released by DemosAU, the answer is yes. The research found only 23% of Australians support growing the size of the Commonwealth Parliament, while 53% oppose.

It’s not surprising that many Australians are sceptical of increasing the number of politicians, but if the size of Parliament remains where it is, Australians will have less and less contact with their local MP – which can hardly give them more faith in their politicians.

In the 40 years since Australia last expanded the parliament, the population increased by 11 million – from under 16 million to over 27 million – without Australians getting any more MPs to represent them.

Expanding the lower house by 50% – to 225 seats – would bring Australia’s representation more in line with comparable democracies, as well as the states and territories. It would grow the talent pool for appointing ministers to crucial government jobs. And most importantly, it would make politicians more accountable to the communities that elect them, giving more Australians a chance to meaningfully engage with their local member.

It’s time for our representative democracy to get a bit more representative.