Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that answer the question.
Query: How many members are in the Senate of Australia?
This is a list of members of the Australian Senate following the 2016 double dissolution election on 2 July 2016. All 76 senators were elected due to the election being the result of a double dissolution, and not an ordinary half-senate election. The terms of half of the senators representing each of the six states of Australia were allocated six-year terms ending on 30 June 2022 with the remainder allocated three-year terms ending on 30 June 2019. The terms of senators from the states can only be truncated if another double dissolution election is called. The terms of senators from the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory end on the next dissolution of the House of Representatives.
Born in Adelaide, Teague was educated at the University of Adelaide and Cambridge University, where he gained a Ph.D.. He was employed as a university lecturer until he entered the Senate in 1977. Teague narrowly won the final South Australian Senate position from the then newly formed Australian Democrats after preferences from the Australia Party flowed to Teague ahead of the Democrats. Observers with a sense of irony would have noted that many Australian Democrats, including lead Democrat Senate candidate Ian Gilfillan, were former Australia Party members and the Democrats had initially expected Australia Party preferences.
Part III deals with the House of Representatives. As nearly as practicable, Section 24 requires the House to be composed of twice as many members as the Senate, each elected by a single electorate. This is the so-called 'Nexus', which is designed to prevent swamping of the senate's power in the case of a joint sitting (see Section 57 below). The number of electorates in a State is to be (roughly) proportional to its share of the national population.
From 1901 to 1949, the House consisted of either 74 or 75 members (the Senate had 36). Between 1949 and 1984, it had between 121 and 127 members (the Senate had 60 until 1975, when it increased to 64). In 1977, the High Court ordered that the size of the House be reduced from 127 to 124 members to comply with the nexus provision. In 1984, both the Senate and the House were enlarged; since then the House has had between 148 and 150 members (the Senate has 76).
The Greens also lost one Senate position in South Australia, decreasing their Senate representation from ten to nine Senators, to a total of ten Green members in the Parliament of Australia. The result was seen as disappointing, and caused internal divisions to flare up, with former Federal Leader Bob Brown calling upon Senator Lee Rhiannon to resign, citing the "need for renewal".
This is a list of members of the Australian Senate between July 2014 and May 2016. Half of the state senators had been elected at the August 2010 election and had terms due to finish on 30 June 2017; the other half of the state senators were elected at the September 2013 election and had terms due to finish on 30 June 2020. The territory senators were elected at the September 2013 election and their terms ended at the dissolution of the House of Representatives, which was May 2016. The new Senate first met in July 2014, with state senators elected in 2013 sworn in on 7 July 2014. Ascertaining the chamber's final composition was complicated by the loss of 1,375 ballot papers in Western Australia, leading to the Court of Disputed Returns voiding the result there, and necessitating a special Senate election in Western Australia (held on 5 April 2014).
The position is provided for by Section 17 of the Constitution of Australia. The Senate elects one of its members as president at the start of each new term, or whenever the position is vacant. This is usually—though not necessarily—a member of the party or coalition that holds the most seats in the Senate. The largest party in the Senate is not always the governing party, as government is determined by the House of Representatives. The President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives may consequently be from different parties.
From 1901 the method of voting for the Senate was block voting, where each elector voted for as many candidates as there were vacancies. This system tended to result in all senators for one state being elected by a single party, the extreme of which was in the 1943 election where all 18 senators were members of the Labor party. The system did however make the allocation of terms simple. Thus in 1901, and 1914, the Senate resolved that the first three candidates elected would receive the 6-year term.
The Pirate Party was approached by Glenn Druery to be a member of the Minor Party Alliance, but chose to eschew membership of the alliance due to the membership requirement of preferencing far right parties highly, and instead chose to base preferences upon a democratic vote of its members along policy lines. Democratically deciding their Senate preferences is now standard practice for Pirate Party Australia. It did so in the 2014 Western Australia Senate Rerun.
The position replaced the Leader of the Government in the Senate (), which from 1867–2015 was a senator who was a member of the governing party and led the government side in the Senate of Canada (whether or not that party held a majority in the Senate). The old position had almost always been held by a cabinet minister, except briefly in 1926, from 1958–63 and since 2013. Due to current Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's 2014 decision to remove senators from the Liberal Party of Canada caucus, leaving them all effectively sitting as independent senators, Trudeau named a Representative of the Government in the Senate in the 42nd Canadian Parliament rather than a government leader. The situation has created some uncertainty about how the Senate will function, and how government legislation will be brought to the Senate. Retired civil servant Peter Harder was named to the position on March 18, 2016.
This is a list of members of the Australian Senate from 1951 to 1953. The 28 April 1951 election was a double dissolution called by Prime Minister of Australia Robert Menzies in an attempt to gain control of the Senate and to pass a bill to ban the Communist Party of Australia, if necessary at a joint sitting of both houses. All 121 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 60 seats in the Senate were up for election. The incumbent Liberal Party of Australia led by Menzies with coalition partner the Country Party led by Arthur Fadden defeated the Australian Labor Party led by Ben Chifley and gained control of the Senate with 32 seats to Labor's 28.
The position of President of the Senate has been disproportionately held by Senators representing the least populous states and territories. There have been 25 presidents of the Senate since 1901. Of these 15 have come from the least populous states (Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania) or the Australian Capital Territory, and 10 have come from the three most populous states (New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland). All senate presidents have been members of major parties, though not necessarily the governing party.
McEwen made her maiden speech to the Senate on 9 August 2005. Previously holding positions such as the Chief Government Whip in the Senate and Chair of the Environment, Communications and the Arts (Legislation) Senate Committee, following the 2013 federal election McEwen became the Chief Opposition Whip in the Senate. She was also a full member on the Joint Standing Committee of Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade and the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, as well as a participating member on a number of other Senate committees. McEwen was also a member of a number of Parliamentary groups, including the Parliamentary Group on Population and Development, and she was Secretary of the Australia/Papua New Guinea Parliamentary Friendship Group. 
During her time in Federal Parliament, McEwen was particularly active on issues regarding workplace relations, higher education, Australia's indigenous population, and veterans' affairs. Until the 2016 election, McEwen was the duty senator for the federal electorates of Sturt and Barker in South Australia.
In Australia's Federal Parliament, the ACT is represented by four federal members: two members of the House of Representatives represent the Division of Fenner and the Division of Canberra and it is one of only two territories to be represented in the Senate, with two Senators (the other being the Northern Territory). The Member for Fenner and the ACT Senators also represent the constituents of the Jervis Bay Territory.
In 1904, Needham was elected to the Western Australian Legislative Assembly as the Labor member for Fremantle, serving until 1905. In 1906, he was elected to the Australian Senate as a Labor Senator for Western Australia. He was the only one of Western Australia's six Labor senators to remain loyal to the party after the 1916 split over conscription, and he lost his seat in 1919 as a result. Re-elected in 1922, his second Senate term lasted until his defeat in 1928, taking effect in 1929. In 1933, he returned to the Legislative Assembly as the member for Perth, shifting to North Perth in 1950. He left the Assembly in 1953. Needham died in 1956. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving member of the 1907–1910 Senate.
Howe's father, Francis Howe, was a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives and the Massachusetts Senate.
This is a list of members of the Australian Senate from 1914 to 1917. The 5 September 1914 election was a double dissolution called by Prime Minister of Australia Joseph Cook in an attempt to gain control of the Senate. All 75 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 36 seats in the Senate were up for election. The incumbent Commonwealth Liberal Party was defeated by the opposition Australian Labor Party led by Andrew Fisher, who announced with the outbreak of World War I during the campaign that under a Labor Government, Australia would "stand beside the mother country to help and defend her to the last man and the last shilling."
Section 24 of the Constitution of Australia requires that the total number of members of the Australian House of Representatives shall be "as nearly as practicable" twice as many as the number of members of the Australian Senate. There is presently a total of 76 senators: 12 senators from each of the six states and two from each of the two autonomous internal territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). There are 150 members of the Australian House of Representatives.
This is a list of members of the Australian Senate from 1987 to 1990. It consisted of twelve senators for each of the six states of Australia and two senators representing each of the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory. All members were elected at the 1987 election following a double dissolution of both houses of parliament, rather than the normal case of only half of the state senators facing election.
Because the House has twice as many members as the Senate, the former has an advantage in a joint sitting. However, the voting system used for the Senate before 1949, which might be called "multiple at-large voting", often led to landslide if not wipe-out results in each state, resulting in a winning margin over the whole of Australia of up to 36-0. That would have given the party or grouping enjoying such a large Senate majority an advantage in any joint sitting, had there been one.
Section 13 of the Constitution of Australia provides for three aspects of the terms of members of the Australian Senate, the timing of elections, the commencement date of their terms and for the Senate to allocate 6 and 3-year terms following a double dissolution of the Parliament of Australia. While member of the House of Representatives have a maximum three-year term, members of the Senate have a fixed 6-year term, subject only to the parliament being dissolved by a double dissolution.
Josephine Vallentine (born 30 May 1946) is an Australian peace activist and politician, a former senator for Western Australia. She entered the Senate on 1 July 1985 after election as a member of the Nuclear Disarmament Party but sat as an independent and then as a member of the Greens Western Australia from 1 July 1990. She resigned on 31 January 1992.
Another option is to have a head official or remaining members of the elected body appoint a new member to fulfill the vacancy. In Australia, for example, the state legislatures appoint replacements members to the Australian Senate, now done at the suggestion of the party of the outgoing senator. Before this rule, disputes over Senate vacancies contributed to the Australian constitutional crisis of 1975, ultimately resulting in a 1977 amendment to the Constitution of Australia to provide that the legislature must elect a member of the same party as the outgoing senator. Vacancies in the New South Wales Legislative Council are filled in a similar way by a joint sitting of both the legislative council and assembly.
On 3 April 2001, Senator Chris Schacht, then a member of the Australian Senate, gave notice that on the next day of sitting he would introduce the "Award of Victoria Cross for Australia Bill 2001" to award the Victoria Cross for Australia to certain persons. The next sitting day, 4 April 2001, Senator Schacht introduced the bill for three members of the Australian forces to be awarded the Victoria Cross for Australia. The bill was read a first time and Senator Schacht gave his Second Reading Speech in which he said it could be argued that an Act conferring a Victoria Cross for Australia may be beyond the legislative power of the Parliament but he believed that the "naval and military defence of the Commonwealth" power under section 51(vi) of the Constitution gave the Parliament authority to legislate with respect to honours and awards. In accordance with normal procedure the debate was then adjourned. On 1 June 2001, Sid Sidebottom, the Member for Braddon introduced the "Defence Act Amendment (Victoria Cross) Bill 2001". The Bill was similar to the Senate bill and Sidebottom also believed that the Parliament had power under section 51(vi) of the Constitution. Neither bill was again debated before the 2001 Australian federal election. Both Senator Schacht and Mr Sidebottom were members of the Australian Labor Party, then in opposition and the issue was included by the then opposition leader Kim Beazley in his campaign in the following General Election. The awards were intended "to raise the profile and recognition of three ordinary Australians, who displayed outstanding bravery."
Article 4, Section 3, of the state constitution places several limitations on the size and composition of the General Assembly. The Senate can contain no more than fifty members, and the senators serve for a term of four years. The House of Representatives can contain no more than one hundred members, and the representatives serve terms of two years. There is no limit to how many terms a state senator or representative may serve.