Helen Coonan voted generally against same-sex marriage equality
How Helen Coonan voted compared to someone who agrees that the Federal Government should amend the Marriage Act 1961 so that same-sex couples can marry under Australian law
Most important divisions relevant to this policy
These are the most important divisions related to the policy “for same-sex marriage equality” which Helen Coonan could have attended. They are weighted much more strongly than other divisions when calculating the position of Helen Coonan on this policy.
| Division | Helen Coonan | Supporters vote |
|---|---|---|
25th Feb 2010, 4:05 PM – Senate Marriage Equality Amendment Bill 2009 - Second Reading - Read a second time |
absent | Yes |
12th Nov 2008, 6:53 PM – Senate Same-Sex Relationships (Equal Treatment in Commonwealth Laws - General Law Reform) Bill 2008 - In Committee - Legalise same-sex marriage |
absent | Yes |
Other divisions relevant to this policy
These are less important divisions which are related to the policy “for same-sex marriage equality” which Helen Coonan could have attended.
| Division | Helen Coonan | Supporters vote |
|---|---|---|
5th Jul 2011 – Senate Motions - Same-Sex Relationships - Support marriage equality |
absent | Yes |
26th Nov 2009, 10:32 AM – Senate Motions - Civil Partnerships - ACT bill |
No | Yes |
26th Nov 2009, 10:27 AM – Senate Motions - National Year of Action on Marriage Equality |
No | Yes |
8th Feb 2007, 10:47 AM – Senate Motions - Same-Sex Relationships - ACT legalising same-sex relationships |
absent | Yes |
15th Jun 2006, 1:06 PM – Senate Motions - Australian Capital Territory Civil Unions Legislation - Disallow the government's attempt to disallow the legislation |
No | Yes |
How "voted generally against" is worked out
They Vote For You gives each vote a score based on whether the MP voted in agreement with the policy or not. These scores are then averaged with a weighting across all votes that the MP could have voted on relevant to the policy. The overall average score is then converted to a simple english language phrase based on the range of values it's within.
When an MP votes in agreement with a policy the vote is scored as 100%. When they vote against the policy it is scored as 0% and when they are absent it is scored half way between the two at 50%. The half way point effectively says "we don't know whether they are for or against this policy".
The overall agreement score for the policy is worked out by a weighted average of the scores for each vote. The weighting has been chosen so that the most important votes have a weighting 5 times that of the less important votes. Also, absent votes on less important votes are weighted 5 times less again to not penalise MPs for not attending the less important votes. Pressure of other work means MPs or Senators are not always available to vote – it does not always mean they've abstained.
| Type of vote | Agreement score (s) | Weight (w) | No of votes (n) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Most important votes | MP voted with policy | 100% | 25 | 0 |
| MP voted against policy | 0% | 25 | 0 | |
| MP absent | 50% | 25 | 2 | |
| Less important votes | MP voted with policy | 100% | 5 | 0 |
| MP voted against policy | 0% | 5 | 3 | |
| MP absent | 50% | 1 | 2 | |
The final agreement score is a weighted average (weighted arithmetic mean) of the scores of the individual votes.
Average agreement score = sum(n×w×s) / sum(n×w) = 26.0 / 67 = 39%.
And then this average agreement score
- between 95% and 100% becomes "voted consistently for"
- between 85% and 95% becomes "voted almost always for"
- between 60% and 85% becomes "voted generally for"
- between 40% and 60% becomes "voted a mixture of for and against"
- between 15% and 40% becomes "voted generally against"
- between 5% and 15% becomes "voted almost always against"
- between 0% and 5% becomes "voted consistently against"