Minor parties with deeply opposed ideologies have come up with a strategy to target the Greens and the Coalition at the next election.

The parties are facing political annihilation under Senate voting reforms - backed by the Coalition and the Greens - expected to pass within a fortnight.

About 30 parties including the Anti-Paedophile Party, the Sex Party, the Voluntary Euthanasia Party, and Love Australia or Leave met in Sydney on the weekend in a meeting convened by the so-called "preference whisperer" Glenn Druery.

The voting reforms that are expected to pass parliament will mean parties will no longer be able to swap preferences, voiding complex preference deals that saw Senator Ricky Muir elected at the last election on less than 1% of the vote. The changes would ultimately make it harder for minor political parties to be elected to the Senate.

Before the Saturday meeting, some of the parties had spoken publicly about targeting Coalition and Greens seats in the upcoming federal election, but this was the first time they had met to discuss the idea properly. This kind of retaliation would not stop the reforms, but it would hurt the two parties and could even help Labor win the election.

Although each of these parties on their own do not represent a large number of voters, together they account for more than 20 per cent of the vote at the last federal election (that's including the Palmer United Party and Nick Xenophon).

"They've been excluded and I have no doubt those three million voters who feel they're now being disenfranchised will react very strongly to this," Family First Party Senator Bob Day told Hack.

Progressive or left-wing parties said they had been betrayed by the Greens, which has supported the Coalition's Senate reforms. Conservative or right-wing parties said they had been abandoned by the Coalition.

Although these parties already come under the umbrella of the Minor Party Alliance, this level of co-operation is unprecedented, according to Liberal Democratic Party Senator David Leyonhjelm, who says he has been attending minor party meetings like this since 2007.

"The previous meetings were all about doing preferences deal with parties you're comfortable with," he said. "This is about survival."

The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

'I don't think any of you can be elected'

The key figure behind the rise of minor preference deals in the last two decades is a former carpenter who says he stumbled upon the idea of preference harvesting when reading a book one day. Glenn Druery has become a powerful and controversial figure in Australian politics through his ability to take advantage of existing Senate electoral law and get minor party candidates elected.

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Mr Druery was the main organiser of the Saturday meeting, which included Senator Leyonhjelm and Senator Day (senators Jacquie Lambie, Glenn Lazarus and Ricky Muir sent apologies. None of these senators face re-election in the upcoming half-senate federal election, unless there is a double dissolution).

"These Minor Party Alliance meetings have been going on for 17 years now and I feel and fear this may be one of the last Minor Party Alliance meetings at a federal level," Mr Druery told Hack.

The meeting was held in a narrow room above a central Sydney street preparing for the annual Mardi Gras parade. It was standing room only.

Mr Druery spoke first.

"These proposed reforms will effectively wipe you out," he told the minor party heads.

I don't think any of you can be elected."

The minor parties say the senate reforms are undemocratic, because they make it harder for people from outside of the major parties from having a shot at being elected. Mr Druery says the major parties have benefited from the flow of preferences from minor parties for many years, and only proposed reforms once the minor parties began organising to send their preferences elsewhere.

"These reforms are the case of school bullies beating you up and not letting you in the classroom anymore," Mr Druery told the meeting.

"That in simple terms is what's going to happen."

10-15 Coalition, Greens seats to be targeted

Mr Druery suggested minor parties run lower house candidates in marginal Coalition seats as well as the Greens-held seat of Melbourne and other seats the Greens could win. Under the plan, these candidates would preference Labor in the lower house instead the two other parties.

The list of seats he suggested should be targeted is different to the the list Druery showed the ABC 730 program in mid-February.

'Preference whisperer' threatens war on Coalition marginals Angry micro parties are threatening to run a marginal seat campaign against the Federal Government.

He told the meeting that, apart from the seat of Melbourne, progressive minor parties should target Batman (Vic), Wills (Vic), Sydney, Richmond (NSW) and Grayndler (NSW).

"If you're on the right, there's no reason for you to go to Melbourne," he said.

Right-wing minor parties, he suggested, should target the marginal Coalition seats of Petrie (Qld), Macarthur (NSW), Deakin (Vic), and La Trobe (Vic).

"[Minor parties] can punish the government and they can punish the Greens," Mr Druery told Hack. "It may cost the Greens seat in Melbourne, it may stop the Greens extending their influence.

"What will the impact be of right wing parties running against the government? Well it could cost them seats, quite a few people are saying they will bring the government down.

"I think that's a bit optimistic, I think that's quite optimistic."

About 10-15 Coalition and Greens seats would be targeted under the plan. The Coalition currently has 90 seats and Labor 55 in the 150-seat lower house.

Druery pointed to the example of Queensland where the LNP Newman government lost an enormous majority after one term.

Druery says this was partly due to the preferences campaign he orchestrated on behalf of the Palmer United Party, Katter Australian Party, One Nation and Family First.

"If the minor parties had not run or had preferenced the LNP, then the LNP would still be in Government," he said. "I can prove that."

"Can that happen federally? If minor parties are organised and run an effective, strategic, well-balanced campaign, they will make a difference."

Senator Day predicted the minor party campaign would have a much bigger impact. He said it could prove decisive in as many as 30 seats.

I'm predicting now it will cost the Government the election," he said.

Left-wing parties agree to target left-wing seats

Of the 34 minor parties represented at the meeting, more than half identified as left-wing or 'progressive'. Many come under the umbrella of the Alliance for Progress, organised by James Jansson, who is also leader of the Science Party.

According to Jansson, there are 14 parties in the Alliance, and together they have a membership of 14,000 (becoming a member of these parties is usually free).

Jansson said the Alliance was thinking about running candidates in the seats of Melbourne, Sydney and Grayndler and right now it would not be preferencing the Greens (in the lower house).

"We have preferenced the Greens highly in the past - but these changes fundamentally affects our democracy. Just because they've had good votes on issues we agree with in past - it doesn't mean they have a blank cheque to destroy our democracy."

Melbourne is the only Greens seat in the lower house. Adam Bandt retained the seat in 2013 with a margin of about 10 per cent. About eight per cent of the primary vote went to minor parties.

Australian Sex Party leader Fiona Patten said the party was going to preference Labor in the inner-city electorates of NSW and Victoria, including the seat of Melbourne.

Australian Muslim Party founder Diaa Mohammed said the party was running people in the lower house to go against the Greens.

Animal Justice Party NSW MLC Mark Pearson said the party was "seriously looking" at preferencing Labor ahead of the Greens "in order to knock this down".

Among the right-wing parties, Shooters and Fishers party NSW MLC Robert Brown said the party would target marginal Coalition seats.

"Most of these parties in the room up there have absolutely nothing in common," he said.

"The minor parties are short on resources, but if we combine and focus on single seats all of sudden we have enough people.

"We'll punish them.

This group upstairs I think has already decided they will do it."

'The end of an era'

The meeting also considered a High Court challenge to the reforms and an advertising campaign, but both ideas were quickly dismissed as ineffective.

Mr Druery acknowledged that hurting the Coalition and Greens at the next election would not stop the reforms, and Labor had not committed to repealing them if they won office.

The reforms are also blow to his business model of advising minor parties, though he says he has not made a lot of money from his work orchestrating minor party campaigns.

"I can assure you minor parties is minor money," he says.

He set up the Minor Party Alliance in 1999 and has worked professionally in politics since 2008. Some parties contract his business, Independent Liaison, as a paid advisor, but he says it's free to join the Minor Party Alliance or attend the meetings.

"Today was a sad day for me.

I have a bit of a lump in my throat. This could be the end of an era

Editor's note: This story originally had a photo of a list of the names of parties said to have attended the Minor Party Alliance meeting. The Pirate Party was on the list but did not attend the meeting.