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. PREFERENTIAL VOTING.
The election, for the Swan seat, in
Western.Australia, was a perfect il-
lustration of how preferential voting
works. When the first count was com-
pleted, Mr. Corboy, the retiring La-
bor member, was slightly in the lead,
but he retained, only 233 of the pre-
ference votes of the excluded Nation-
alist candidate (Hedges), whereas
Prowse, the Farmers' representative
received 3727. "The first count read:
Corboy (L.) 7444, Prowse (F.) 7312,
Hedges (N.) 4260. Now on the old,
rough-and-ready system of counting,
Mr. Corboy would have been declared
elected, though only 7444 had voted
for him and n,S72 had voted for other
men. The new method prevents such
ridiculous unfairness, and the final
count reads: Prowse 11,039, Corboy
7977. Majority for Prowse 3062. Thc
figures, besides justifying the prefer-
ence vote, show how close is the en-
tente between Nationalists and Far-
mers. In not a single constituency
has the counting of their mutual pre-
ferences been any good to Labor. La-
bor ;knows -it only too keenly, and
might just as well drop all this press .
ogling in the direction of the new fac-
tor, for it is not only.useless but quite
out of keeping with the arrogant atti-
tude of a'party that.-has for so long
professed to scorn all alliances. Far
mef leaders and Nationalist leaders
'.may. disagree on this and that; but
they will entirely misinterpret the
intentions of their followers if they
fail , to work harmoniously' together
in the math: . -, . ; "...?"' ;.
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