How Sam Dastyari voted compared to someone who agrees that asylum seekers who arrive in Australia without a visa, particularly those who arrive by boat, should have their asylum claims processed regionally in a country such as the Republic of Nauru or Papua New Guinea (See the policy "For offshore processing of asylum seekers" for more on processing asylum seeker claims in Australian territories like Christmas Island)

Most important divisions relevant to this policy

These are the most important divisions related to the policy “for regional processing of asylum seekers” which Sam Dastyari could have attended. They are weighted much more strongly than other divisions when calculating the position of Sam Dastyari on this policy.

Division Sam Dastyari Supporters vote

25th Jun 2015, 6:15 PM – Senate Migration Amendment (Regional Processing Arrangements) Bill 2015 - Third Reading - Pass the bill

Yes Yes

25th Jun 2015, 12:21 PM – Senate Migration Amendment (Regional Processing Arrangements) Bill 2015 - Second Reading - Agree with the main idea

Yes Yes

Other divisions relevant to this policy

These are less important divisions which are related to the policy “for regional processing of asylum seekers” which Sam Dastyari could have attended.

Division Sam Dastyari Supporters vote

10th Aug 2017, 12:38 PM – Senate Motions - Asylum Seekers - Bring them to Australia

absent No

20th Jun 2017, 4:00 PM – Senate Motions - Asylum Seekers - Close Nauru and Manus Is. detention centres

No No

29th Mar 2017 – Senate Motions - Asylum Seekers - End detention on Nauru and Manus Island

absent No

12th Sep 2016, 4:48 PM – Senate Committees - Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee - Nauru & Manus Island centres

Yes No

4th Feb 2016, 12:37 PM – Senate Motions - Asylum Seekers - Let Them Stay

No No

25th Jun 2015, 5:02 PM – Senate Migration Amendment (Regional Processing Arrangements) Bill 2015 - in Committee - Detention of children

absent No

4th Dec 2014, 8:58 PM – Senate Migration and Maritime Powers Legislation Amendment (Resolving the Asylum Legacy Caseload) Bill 2014 - Second Reading - Agree with bill's main idea

absent Yes

4th Dec 2014, 12:15 AM – Senate Migration and Maritime Powers Legislation Amendment (Resolving the Asylum Legacy Caseload) Bill 2014 - Third Reading - Pass the bill

absent Yes

4th Dec 2014, 12:11 AM – Senate Migration and Maritime Powers Legislation Amendment (Resolving the Asylum Legacy Caseload) Bill 2014 - in Committee - Agree with the amended bill

absent Yes

How "voted almost always 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 0
Less important votes MP voted with policy 100% 5 2
MP voted against policy 0% 5 1
MP absent 50% 1 6

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) = 63.0 / 71 = 89%.

And then this average agreement score