How Bill Heffernan voted compared to someone who agrees that the Federal Government should respond to reports about high levels of child sexual abuse in some Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory by introducing the Northern Territory National Emergency Response or the very similar Stronger Futures Policy, also referred to as "the intervention"

Most important divisions relevant to this policy

These are the most important divisions related to the policy “for the Intervention in the Northern Territory” which Bill Heffernan could have attended. They are weighted much more strongly than other divisions when calculating the position of Bill Heffernan on this policy.

Division Bill Heffernan Supporters vote

28th Jun 2012, 2:13 AM – Senate Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory (Consequential and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2011 - Third Reading - Pass the bill

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 12:25 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 and related bills - Third Reading - Read a third time

Yes Yes

14th Aug 2007, 6:15 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 - Second Reading - Read a second time

Yes Yes

Other divisions relevant to this policy

These are less important divisions which are related to the policy “for the Intervention in the Northern Territory” which Bill Heffernan could have attended.

Division Bill Heffernan Supporters vote

28th Jun 2012, 11:07 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 - Leave schedule 1 as it is

absent Yes

28th Jun 2012, 12:57 AM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 - Agree to Australian Greens amendments reducing sunset clause periods

No No

28th Jun 2012, 12:01 AM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 - Leave schedule 2 as it is

Yes Yes

21st Jun 2011 – Senate Motions - Northern Territory Emergency Response - Repeal

absent No

27th Nov 2008, 9:04 PM – Senate Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Emergency Response Consolidation) Bill 2008 - Third Reading - Read a third time

absent Yes

27th Nov 2008, 8:52 PM – Senate Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Emergency Response Consolidation) Bill 2008 - In Committee - 'Must' use discretion

absent Yes

27th Nov 2008, 7:00 PM – Senate Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Emergency Response Consolidation) Bill 2008 - In Committee - Keep the permit system

absent No

27th Nov 2008, 5:51 PM – Senate Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Emergency Response Consolidation) Bill 2008 - In Committee - Exempts from discrimination laws

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 10:50 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 - In Committee - Keep clauses 4 to 7 unchanged

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 9:28 PM – Senate Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Northern Territory National Emergency Response and Other Measures) Bill 2007 - In Committee - Access to Aboriginal land

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 5:45 PM – Senate Northern Territory National Emergency Response Bill 2007 - In Committee - Keep part 8 unchanged

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 1:40 PM – Senate Northern Territory National Emergency Response Bill 2007 - In Committee - Publicly funded computers, acquisition of rights/titles/etc, business management, bail & sentencing

absent Yes

16th Aug 2007, 10:49 AM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 - In Committee - Leave schedules unchanged

absent Yes

15th Aug 2007, 12:22 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 and related bills - In Committee - Acquisition of rights, titles and interests in land

absent Yes

14th Aug 2007, 6:10 PM – Senate Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Welfare Payment Reform) Bill 2007 and related bills - Second Reading - Delay passage of bill

absent No

How "voted generally for" 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 2
MP voted against policy 0% 25 0
MP absent 50% 25 1
Less important votes MP voted with policy 100% 5 2
MP voted against policy 0% 5 0
MP absent 50% 1 13

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) = 79.0 / 98 = 81%.

And then this average agreement score