Two out of the three independant are supporting the Labor government. Giving the Labor party 76 seats and the Liberal/Nationals coalition 74 seats. This means that Australia has its first elected female Prime Minister.

just saw this on the news

I think she is much better than the crazy dude who challenged her!

The concessions given to the greens and the independants are looking great. The reform of the parliament especially could structurally makesthe democratic process in Australia far better.

Government doesn't look stable though, requires five seperate entities to agree.

Agreed. But if they can get even some of the concessions moving forward then it could very well be worth it in the long term even if it collapses before the term is up. Furthermore if they can get the national broadband network moving forwards it'd be great for the country (along as our debt is managed correctly of course).

Plus, with the greens in power in the senate, the internet filter wont pass either. So we may get our cake and eat it too. Or it'll all collapse and we'll hit the elections booths again LOL.

Actually the Lib/Nats won the election 73 seats to 72. But Labour formed a minority govt by getting sufficient independant support.

Labour has little choice but to make this govt work if they want to stay in power. Because if they need to call an election in less than 18 months due to the instability of their current arrangement It pretty much plays right into Lib/Nat 's hands and they are pretty well assured a win. And the Rudd overthrow will still be too fresh in the Queenslanders' minds for those who voted against Gillard to forgive her.

Its irrelivant that the liberal/nationals have one seat more, since the people didn't give either party enough votes to win the seats required. What does matter is that labor has the seats at this point in time. Sure it could all collapse, but to say that the liberal/nationals (which is a coalition in itself remember) won the election is just flat out wrong since they didn't get the 76 seats and Tony Abbott isn't going to be the PM (at least for now).

My problem with international politics is that it requires too much information... because the names are deceptive.

A Liberal/ National coalition sounds like it'd be a far left and far right wing coalition.

The liberals are actually a right wing conservative party, go figure I know...

Never in my life has a government been elected with a more pathetic and inept set of policies, and after such a shockingly incompetent tenure as leaders.  That said, the Opposition isn't much better. 

Still, the knife cuts both ways.  One could argue that some of the parliamentary reforms coming in are great for democratic debate, and they would be correct.  On the other hand, the Coalition won far more votes than Labor, and yet they do not get to form government because Julia Gillard gave the regional Independants a $10 Billion bribe...