Let’s say you and your buddy Saul work at a bank, and the two of you have just pulled off the greatest heist of all time.

You got into the vault, cracked the lockboxes, filched the Fabergé eggs, and made it out free and clear. There were no witnesses, no security footage, and your alibis are good.

You only have one last hurdle: the police suspect it’s an inside job, and they’ve brought you and Saul in for questioning. They stick you in separate rooms and begin grilling the two of you. As long as neither of you cracks under pressure, you both get away with the loot.

But then they make you an offer: if you turn on Saul and rat first, they’ll give you a light sentence. However, the time you have to act on this offer is limited  –  as they’ve made the exact same offer to Saul, and only one of you gets the deal… The other one will be shipped off to prison.

Oh and by the way, they’ve almost got a damning piece of evidence, something you missed in your cleanup, which will send the both of you down. You suspect this is a bluff, but there’s no way to be sure…

Therein lies the prisoner’s dilemma: do you hold out, trusting that Saul will do the same, and both of you walk away scot free? Or do you turn on Saul and sell him out, knowing that at any moment he might do the same to you?

The 51st Parliament of Tasmania brings with it an interesting variation of the above.

With fourteen Liberals working in concert with three Jacqui Lambie Network (JLN) members, they only need a single extra vote to get legislation passed by a majority 18 votes in the new 35-member House of Assembly. With a field of three independents to choose from they have multiple pathways by which they can secure that last vote.

This is good for government stability, but the numbers in play hamstring the three independents and the people who voted for them. They are caught in the dilemma: their ability to get what they want in exchange for their vote is undercut by the independent in the other room, who may be about to sell their vote more cheaply in exchange for a smaller (but still tangible) reward.

And of course the clock is always ticking. If they make themselves too intransigent, the government may simply send us (and them) back to the hustings, a roll of the dice which may cost any one of them their seat from contenders closing in on all sides. Garland won his seat on the slimmest of margins, and could have easily lost to a party candidate had the elimination order turned out a little differently.

Johnston suffered a 4.2% swing against her at this election, a repeat of which would drop her out of the running at the next. O’Byrne possibly has the least to lose, though politics is a fickle business and a revitalised Labor (if such a thing is possible) may bring with it enough of a swing away from O’Byrne and back to the alma mater that he loses out to some third-tier Labor candidate or even (quelle horreur) a Green.

That pressure means they have incentives to accept a deal rather than hold out and risk going down for a nickel-and-dime.

Although it is in the nature of independents to work independently, their strength in the 51st Parliament would be enhanced if they managed to work together as a pseudo-bloc. They could do this by reinforcing each other’s demands, and only voting to pass legislation once all three of them have received something in return.

Legislation, then, would typically fail with seventeen votes, or pass with twenty or more. The challenge with that, of course, is that each of them is sitting alone in their interrogation room with Rockcliff standing over them, telling them they only have a limited opportunity to accept this deal before they head next door and hear from one of the others.

And as it is the nature of independents to work independently, none of them can ever be sure that their associate in the next room isn’t about to start trilling like a songbird, selling themselves for a smaller prize to undercut the other two, while securing a small personal win they can take back to their home electorate.

The election of three independents to the lower house is a historic occurrence in Tasmania, and one to be celebrated. It is a reflection of our diverse political interests as electors.

But the firm partnership between the Liberals and JLN at seventeen seats means that these three individuals may end up less kingmaker and more prisoner, caught in an unending trilemma.

JT Young is studying a Master of Public Policy via Macquarie University, and is a keen observer of Tasmanian politics. He also writes on Medium.