Paddy Glynn

The possibility of using OPV instead was not a major topic of the debate, although it did come up briefly.

In response to a question, the minister, Paddy Glynn, clarified that all preferences must be marked.

Labor MPs William Mahony and James Fenton objected, with Mahony calling it scandalous.

Glynn defended the decision to use CPV by referring to its usage in Victoria and Western Australia.

But it's likely the Nationalists understated the growth of what became the Country Party.

Rather than just polling a small share of the vote and those votes flowing back to the Nationalists, the Farmers' candidates often pushed the Nationalists into third place, and Nationalist preferences then flowed to them.

The Farmers groups won 11 seats at the 1919 federal election, and the newly formed Country Party won 14 seats in 1922, negotiating a coalition with the Nationalists, which saw Billy Hughes replaced as prime minister.

In the early years of preferential voting, the parties did experiment with running multiple candidates.