Carlton Supporters Club

The speaker has a casting vote in the event of tied vote.

The speaker is elected by secret ballot. It is convention that the speaker is from the government but there's nothing in the constitution preventing him/her coming from the opposition or cross benches.  In fact, Peter Slipper was a Liberal MP when elected as speaker during the last Labor government.  Slipper resigned from the LNP when he took the speaker's role.

Slipper was speaker for a minority government... you don't need to do that sort of numbers trick if you get to 76 seats.

I'm waiting for my car to be serviced and your comment about it having to be a 2 seat majority got me thinking... and i'm not really sure what the answer is to be honest.

I just thought 76 seats was a 1 seat majority because you command 75 votes on the floor (v 74 others)... if you loose 1 seat you can't form government in your own right. 

Maybe they get to 75 seats and Bob Katter ends up as speaker.

Dig a big hole, chuck all the kents in it, back fill it and start over again.

Dig a big hole, chuck all the kents in it, back fill it and start over again.

I guess the bottom line is that you have to get at least 2 more seats than the rest in order to command a majority.  A 76-74 majority becomes a working majority of one if convention is followed and the speaker comes from the government side.