Australian election slang
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Caitlin Cassidy, "Spruiking, fake tradies and corflute stoushes: how to understand the Australian election", The Guardian 4/29/2025:
Australians pride themselves on their distinctive federal elections. It’s among a handful of nations that enforces compulsory voting, boasting a turnout rate of more than 90%. The preferential voting system, in theory, means no votes are wasted and choice matters. In recent years, Australians even have an emblem for their civic duty – a democracy sausage – the natural conclusion of voting on a Saturday at schools eager to raise funds.
Also unique is Australian campaign vernacular, which is, year after year, keenly adopted by the media and politicians alike. From donkey voting to corflute stoushes and spruiking, here are some of the weird idioms you need to know to keep abreast of what’s been happening in the lead-up to Saturday’s federal election
Check out the rest of the article to learn about rorts, corflutes, stoush, spruiking, tradies, fake tradies, voting informally, and donkey voting.
No doubt commenters can contribute equally opaque political terminology from other countries.
JPL said,
May 6, 2025 @ 3:02 pm
"It’s among a handful of nations that enforces compulsory voting, boasting a turnout rate of more than 90%."
I once canvassed the native speakers in our department about a sentence like this one (contributed by a student in class) as to what they thought was the correct subject-verb agreement, or anaphor of the relativizer "that". The results were about evenly split. (It was probably more equivocal than this one, however.)
David Morris said,
May 6, 2025 @ 3:26 pm
I hadn't heard 'corflutes' until the last election (2022). I would call them 'posters'. They have been mercifully rare in my safe electorate this election, but I have seen entire fences of them in other electorates. One of my sisters, who lives in South Australia, said that they've been banned there. Quick research shows that they are 'restricted' rather than 'banned'.
David Marjanović said,
May 6, 2025 @ 4:51 pm
Further discussion and etymologies here; in short, corflute is not in fact widely known or understood (and when it is, it often is only as the name of the material the posters are made of), but the others are real.
Chester Draws said,
May 6, 2025 @ 7:04 pm
Most of these are antipodean rather than uniquely Australian, and most are very old.
NZ has long had rorts, stoushes and tradies. They are sufficiently common that I wouldn't even call them slang. Stoush obviously has some close synonyms, but what else do you call a rort or a tradie? If a whole country recognises and uses a word in general speech, is it actually slang or merely idiom?
We don't have compulsory voting, so we don't need informal votes and donkey votes.
Spruiking I thought was UK anyway.
The only one that we really don't have is corflutes. Both the word and the concept.
HS said,
May 6, 2025 @ 7:42 pm
I was just about to post the comment below about New Zealand English when I saw that Chester Draws beat me to it! But I'll post it anyway because I disagree with him on a couple of points – we certainly have informal voting as both a thing and a term, and we certainly have "corflutes" as a thing though not as a word.
"Rort", "stouch", and "informal vote" are common in New Zealand English., but I've never heard of "spruiking".
I've never heard of "corflute" though I'm familiar with both the substance and the objects. I would talk of election "signs", "billboards", or "hoardings". I might also say "posters" although I tend to think of those as paper signs that are pasted up.
"Tradie" is common in New Zealand English for a tradesperson, though championing tradies is perhaps not as important in New Zealand politics as it appears to be in Australia. The suffix "ie" is common in New Zealand English – e.g. a postman is a "postie" and a motorbike rider is a "bikie".
I haven't heard the term "donkey vote" and it's not a thing in New Zealand elections since we have a different voting system to Australia (Mixed Member Proportional as opposed to Preferential Voting) and voting isn't compulsory.
@JPL that sentence pulled me up short when I read this story in the Guardian last week. I would definitely instinctively say "It’s among a handful of nations that enforce compulsory voting", i.e. plural agreement.
Arthur Baker said,
May 6, 2025 @ 9:09 pm
The Australian electoral system is widely described as enforcing "compulsory voting", but there is no compulsion to vote formally (i.e. register a vote which can be counted). What is compulsory is participation in the voting process. If you are qualified to vote (citizen or permanent resident), you must register. If you are a registered voter, you must participate in the process, or risk being fined. But no-one can force you to vote formally, or even to write anything at all on your ballot-papers. Inside the polling booth, you can write nothing on your ballot paper if you wish, or even scrawl obscenities all over it. No electoral official is authorised to inspect your ballot papers (that would itself be an offence because your voting decision is private). They are only authorised to ensure that you deposit your ballot paper in the appropriate sealed box and that you do not remove a ballot paper from the voting place.
(I've been an Australian citizen for 50 years, resident since 1972, birthplace England).
Gregory Kusnick said,
May 6, 2025 @ 10:22 pm
A rort sounds like what in the US we would call pork: government spending meant to enrich particular districts or industries rather than to advance specific policy goals.
Tradies are what we'd call blue-collar workers.
Arthur Baker said,
May 6, 2025 @ 10:56 pm
GK, yes, Australian English includes the verb "pork-barrel", usually hyphenated. The enrichment of particular districts or industries, pork-barrelling, is usually aimed at winning more votes, and is usually seen as buying votes, an act of mass quasi-bribery. Held in disdain, but not illegal.
A tradie (formally tradesman or tradesperson) is usually qualified (or an apprentice in) plumbing, construction, electricals, horticulture, landscaping etc, and can do domestic work for individual households or be employed in a larger enterprise. "Blue-collar" probably covers all of that.
Julian said,
May 7, 2025 @ 12:31 am
@Gregory Kusnick
"Rorting" has a broader meaning than "porkbarrelling"
The general idea is "taking advantage of the system in a clever, deceitful or unfair way"
Usually spoken in a tone of envy or indignation.
"Did you know that …
"…the cops put speed cameras at places that get most fines, not at places that are best for reducing accidents."
"… small businesses can make the cost of running a vehicle a tax deduction even if hardly any of its use is for work purposes."
" … manufacturers can put 'made in Australia' on a label even if the thing is only assembled in Australia from imported parts."
" … IKEA can advertise discounted prices and only when you get to the cashier do you find that the discount is for members only."
"What a rort!"
Michael Vnuk said,
May 7, 2025 @ 1:28 am
The source says:
Voting informally
Australian elections are notoriously informal in terms of dress sense, but technically an informal vote is when, instead of putting a number against the candidates, you draw something stupid on your ballot paper, such as a penis.
This is not my understanding (and I worked as a polling assistant for the first time on Saturday, issuing ballot papers). The Australian Macquarie Online Dictionary says that 'informal' means: '(of a vote) invalid'. It also lists a phrase 'vote informal', meaning 'to mark a ballot-paper incorrectly thereby invalidating one’s vote.' 'Incorrectly' covers where you put the numbers, how you order them, if you enter nothing, and so on. A vote can be informal either deliberately or accidentally. Writing a slogan or drawing something on the paper does not itself affect the validity of the vote.
There were only a small percentage of informal votes at the booth I was working at. We did a preliminary count once the polls closed at 6pm. Drawings and slogans did not invalidate the votes I saw.
David Morris said,
May 7, 2025 @ 2:50 am
The South Australian legislation is titled the Electoral (Control of Corflutes) Amendement Act 2024. It specifies "an electoral advertising poster", defined as " a poster, notice or sign displaying an electoral advertisement" without reference to the material. In fact the word "corflute(s)" doesn't appear in the text of the act.
David Morris said,
May 7, 2025 @ 6:49 am
This evening at choir practice I sat next to someone who'd stood for a minor party in a safe electorate. I asked him if he naturally used 'corflute' and he said he hadn't encountered it previously and kept calling them 'posters'.
Victor Mair said,
May 7, 2025 @ 5:15 pm
For detailed information about "corflute", see the notes by R. Fenwick and Victor Mair to this post:
"Chinese signs in Australian election" (5/23/19)
The post begins with a picture of a sign that in all probability is made of corflute.
Jim Breen said,
May 8, 2025 @ 2:08 am
I've been involved in elections in Australia for nearly 60 years. The sorts of posters now known as "corflutes" began to be used in the 1980s. Back then they were just called "posters" – the term "corflute" has only appeared recently. I still call them posters.
Josh R said,
May 8, 2025 @ 7:02 pm
Put me in the "plural" camp for "It’s among a handful of nations that enforces compulsory voting."
In this case, "a handful of" is acting as a determiner, not the performer of the verb. Compare: "It's one of many nations that enforce…" vs. It's one of many nations that enforces…" Surely I am not alone in feeling the latter is unnatural.
Also consider "a few". "It's among a few [of] which enforce…"
Heck, write the whole thing out: "Australia is among a small number of nations that enforce…" Then make it an actual number: "Australia is among 15* nations that enforce…"
*Number chosen arbitrarily.
I'm not sure how the Cambridge Grammar would express the rule, but it seems to me that when a determiner, or a determiner phrase (is that a thing?) indicates multiple actors of a verb, then that verb will naturally be made plural, even if the phrase could be analyzed as a singular subject by elementary-school-grammar parts of speech.
David Morris said,
May 9, 2025 @ 5:58 am
Re my comment of May 7, 2025 @ 2:50 am
For 'Amendement' read 'Amendment' (ironic, huh?)
In a previous job as a legal editor, one previous volume included a corrigendum which was, in fact, incorrect itself, relying on nested quotation marks.
Corflute(s) | Never Pure and Rarely Simple said,
May 9, 2025 @ 6:00 am
[…] few days ago, Language Log had a discussion of Australian election slang (we had a national election on 3 May; the overall result is known, but […]
Philip Anderson said,
May 9, 2025 @ 11:15 am
I’ve not met “spruik” in the UK. Dictionaries give it as Australian slang, except for the OED, which says Australia and NZ (and suggest a possible German origin):
https://www.oed.com/dictionary/spruik_v?tl=true
HS said,
May 9, 2025 @ 6:09 pm
Elizabeth and Harry Orsman's Dictionary of New Zealand Words and Phrases (1994) includes "spruik" but classifies it as "obs.", i.e. obsolete and no longer in current use. A quick google search shows some hits from New Zealand in the last 10 years or so. One of the hits is from Russel Norman, the former leader of the Green Party, who is originally from Australia. It seems like it may originally have been both Australian and New Zealand slang, but died out in New Zealand only to be reimported from Australia in fairly recent times. Anyway, I've never heard of it before and I'm reasonably confident in my judgement that most New Zealanders would be unfamiliar with it (although I'm fully aware that it can be extremely dangerous making sweeping judgements like that!).