The parties have a self interest here. They carry large debts and need all the funding they can get. At the moment;
"a candidate or Senate group is eligible for election funding if they obtain at least 4% of the first preference vote in the division or the state or territory they contested.
The amount of election funding payable is calculated by multiplying the number of formal first preference votes received by the rate of payment applicable at the time. This rate is indexed every six months in line with increases in the Consumer Price Index.
The election funding rate from 1 January 2015 to 30 June 2015 is 258.372 cents per eligible vote."
Any reduction in formal votes would require an adjustment in payment amount or method otherwise our elections might be more susceptible to influence by those with the money.
We recently saw a bit of that with PUP.
