Alan Griffin (Bruce, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

It is important today to make it very clear that this package of amendments proposed by the member for Calare to the Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Electoral Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2005 will be supported by the opposition. They particularly relate to the issue of prisoners and the issue of the closure of the roll and seek to maintain the systems that currently stand.

Our position on the bill as a whole is very clear. The bill stinks. It is a rank piece of legislation. It is designed to corrupt the electoral system in a manner to benefit the conservatives. Have no doubt about that. But let us be very clear about these amendments. The comments of the Special Minister of State in closing off the second reading debate were that this is all about the Labor Party—this is all about what Graham Richardson did so long ago. That is what it is about. Basically the position is: ‘We are acting altruistically, honestly and in the best interests of the public, but it is in response to your evil—the things that you did so many years ago,’ which I might add did not in fact work that well.

Let us also be clear about what some of the experts have said. There is one expert that I want to quote. That expert said, ‘There is little evidence of fraud in our electoral roll.’ Who said that? I will tell you who that was. It was Senator Eric Abetz, the previous Special Minister of State. We all know this minister has form on these sorts of issues because we all know where he came from before he landed in Eden-Monaro. It was the Northern Territory. We all know what happened in the Northern Territory. We all know what he was accused of in the Northern Territory. We all know what happened there. It is good to have so many members of the coalition sitting here behind me supporting me while the minister is sitting over there with all his mates.

The fact of the matter is that it is not just us. During the committee hearing into this legislation, a series of experts raised concerns about this proposal. Professor Brian Costar summed it up pretty well. He said:

I think that this conspiracy theory ... that there is out there a vast army of villains who want to take advantage of every nook and cranny of the law to sign up phantom voters ... to rort the system is not based on evidence.

But it was not just him. What about the Australian Electoral Commission? The Australian Electoral Commission has on a number of occasions had an opinion and a view about this issue. On this occasion, they did not. The position taken by the current Electoral Commissioner is one of: ‘If the government does that, then we shall obey.’

But previous Australian Electoral Commissions, even those under Andy Becker—and we all know his links historically—had a very clear position. In 2000, in a submission to an inquiry into the integrity of the electoral roll, the AEC stated:

... the AEC expects the rolls to be less accurate because there will be less time for existing electors to correct their enrolments and for new enrolments to be received.

Their position has been consistently that closing the roll off early will have an impact. So it is not just me; it is not just us. It has been the view of the Electoral Commission on a number of occasions over many years. It is the view of Professor Brian Costar, an independent expert on this matter. But it is not just them either. Let us go to what Antony Green from the ABC said in relation to the JSCEM inquiry into the 2004 election:

If suddenly the election is called two or three months early, people will not have regularised their enrolment. You will cut young people off, as the numbers show ...

That will be the result. The minister made the point that the electoral survey shows that young people vote conservative. You can question that survey—and I have not got long enough to do that because I have got only five minutes—but that is not the point. The point is that you will disenfranchise people.

There is the argument that it is okay, that it is a matter of obeying the law. Let us look at AWB for a second. If Minister Downer had read and understood the cables, if he had done his job, maybe we would not have the problem we have now with AWB. Lots of people out there in the community only fix these sorts of things when they know they have to. It is all right saying that the roll is going to close when elections are called, but unless you have a fixed date approach—which the government reject—the circumstances are that you will not get people acting in this fashion. (Time expired)

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