Greens set to hold balance in Senate

Interesting analysis from the ABC election site:

This election, the Greens have also pitched themselves to voters as the buffer against either major party having the majority in the Senate.

"We've had three years of the Coalition dictating and getting through its nasty WorkChoices legislation, and selling off Telstra, etcetera, without any real review by the Senate and its committee system because they simply had the numbers," Senator Brown said.

Mr Mackerras says the idea of returning an umpire to the Senate will be very attractive to some voters.

"Since the Hawke era effectively, the minor parties have essentially assumed that they would have the balance of power and they have behaved very responsibly," he said.

"But Mr Howard is a control freak, let's face it, and once he got a majority in the Senate, he told the Australian people that they voted for WorkChoices, so he foisted WorkChoices on us. This was a blatant abuse of the Senate's power."

Just imagine if the Greens had held the balance of power for the past three years...