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In Australian politics, the term branch stacking is used to describe the act of recruiting members for a local branch of a political party for the principal purpose of influencing the outcome of internal preselections of candidates for public office. It has become controversial in Australia after several inquiries or contests which received mainstream attention, and most political parties now have clauses in their constitutions which allow "head office" intervention to resolve alleged stacking, with penalties for those who engage in it. Branch stacking itself is legal under Australian law, but some activities like providing false information to the Australian Electoral Commission, such as numbers of members, can be prosecuted as fraud. There are a number of ways that branch stacking may influence the way in which decisions are made within political parties. For example, a party faction may sign up a large number of members in the party who belong to the faction or agree to vote in the manner instructed by the faction. Branch stacking is more frequently alleged in the Australian Labor Party, where the factions are more institutionalised. Besides membership stacking, another technique is to take advantage of the favoured position of unions within the party, especially the significant vote they have at ALP State and national conferences, which in turn determines party policy and elects internal office holders and membership of committees. The committees may in turn determine preselections for party candidates at elections. The number of members in a union determines the number of delegates to the conferences to which it is entitled. This offers an opportunity for stacking to take place at the union level, which then flows through to other organs of the ALP. Party factions and the so-called "numbers men" try to work within the rules (and sometimes outside the rules) to advance their causes and reward their supporters.〔The Age, 28 November 2015: (Shorten allies used disgraced HSU for branch stacking scam )〕 Some have labelled the faction leaders and numbers men as the faceless men of the Labor party, who have also been accused of being driving forces for the election and removal of prime ministers and cabinet ministers. When all factions are playing the system, it is not possible to tell the true views of the party on particular issues. The Hawke-Wran review of the ALP in 2002 claimed branch stacking, largely driven by factions seeking to expand their influence, had a "cancerous" effect on the party and a "deadening" effect on branch activity, as many of the recruited members have no commitment to the party. Commentators and authors within or formerly within the Liberal Party of Australia have claimed similar activity in their branches has had a similar effect. == Activities commonly described as branch stacking == Activities commonly considered to be branch stacking include: * Paying another person's party membership fee, with or without their knowledge. * Recruiting members on the condition that they are then obliged to vote in a particular way. * Recruiting members for the express purpose of influencing the outcome of a ballot within the party. * Recruiting members who do not live at the claimed address of enrolment. * Enrolling people on the electoral roll with false information about their identity or their address of enrolment — this may either take the form of consensual false enrolment, or of forgery. * Organising or paying concessional rate fees for a person who is ineligible for concessional rates. * "Cemetery voting", or using the names of dead people to vote in a party preselection. * Offering inducements to younger or less powerful party members to engage in such behaviour. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Branch stacking」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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