On the topic of this, I've been thinking about how we elect people to fill casual vacancies to STV-At Large Senate seats.
Obviously I floated an idea in the Constitutional Convention about if a casual vacancy arises (in my initial proposal) that the party of which that Senator was a member would appoint his or her successor. This is how the Australian Senate operates.
In local councils that use STV over here, frequently casual vacancies are filled using a countback system of excluding the candidate and using the last election results. I don't know if in this instance that would bump up SPC or Lief, but it's something that bears consideration.
Anyway, it's perhaps an idea we could discuss (probably also in the ConCon) and perhaps see about changing in the meantime (since the final draft of the ConCon may be voted down, while some elements may still be popular). It wouldn't be through before the election to replace DWTL (if one is needed), but it might be a good idea to look at it before the next casual vacancy arises - predominantly since the result of an IRV election to fill one seat may yield very different results to the intention of the voters who elected the Senator in an STV election to fill five seats.
Just a thought that isn't necessarily relevant in the current debate, but perhaps something we should consider and discuss for the future.
It makes sense should we switch to a parliamentary system as leaving the filling of vacancies as the perogative of the party leader of the former MP is a quick & easy way to help increase party power as a party won't get undermined by losing a seat mid-session & people will have an incentive to suck up to the chairman so they get appointed.
