Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the shadow special minister of state and member for Mackellar for her contribution to this debate at the outset. I note, as the member for Melbourne Ports leaves the chamber, that she is always elegant in her word, in her deed and, as I am sure all members agree, in her dress. A classier member of this parliament I think there is not.

Citizenship carries with it responsibilities. Those responsibilities, I think, are celebrated when we hold citizenship ceremonies—and we all in this place attend many of those ceremonies. Some time ago I made some remarks highlighting the need for us to continue to embrace this idea of affirmation ceremonies, where those of us who have become Australian by birth rather than by oath or affirmation have the opportunity to reassert our commitment to our responsibilities of citizenship with those who are taking it for the first time. I think there is an extraordinary commonality in that gesture which I would like to see us all celebrate more and more.

We do have responsibilities. We talk a lot about our rights as citizens, but we also have to talk about our responsibilities. Our citizenship ceremonies are a great opportunity to do that. These rights include, probably above all things, the franchise—the ability to cast our vote. As a country that some 100 years ago was in the minority of world experience in being a parliamentary democracy, we are increasing our numbers these days. As we look at events around the world we are hopeful that more countries will join that list of democracies where people have their say. This opportunity—this right; indeed, this obligation—to exercise that franchise is undoubtedly the thing which people prize most, and should prize most, as Australian citizens. We have many other great rights and responsibilities, from freedom of religion to all other things, and we celebrate those through our citizenship.

The Electoral and Referendum Amendment (Enrolment and Prisoner Voting) Bill 2010 contains some changes to how these rights and responsibilities will operate when it comes to the franchise. I want to refer to some remarks I made in August 2009, when I was a member of the Joint Committee on Electoral Matters, around my analysis of the numbers of the previous election in terms of just how seriously many in this country are taking their right to vote. I said at that time:

… there was one central fact before the committee that we wrestled with, and that was the issue of those who do not vote because they did not enrol to vote, who did not show up to vote or who did not fulfil their responsibilities to vote properly on the day.

When you add up the people who fell into that category in that election in 2007, based on the information provided by the AEC, there were 2.4 million Australians—that is, 2.4 million Australians who would have otherwise been eligible to vote either did not enrol, did not show up or did not vote in accordance with our laws. My speech continued:

There were around 1.138 million who did not enrol to vote, 715,000 who did not show up although they were on the roll, and 510,000 who failed to complete their ballot properly. This is actually an improvement on the situation in 2004, but the fact that one in seven voters—

at the 2007 election—

in a system of compulsory voting in this country do not exercise their franchise because they have not chosen to, they did not get it right or they could not be bothered is, I think, a genuine issue of concern.

It is an issue of serious concern in a parliamentary democracy such as ours.

I support compulsory voting. I think compulsory voting has been good for this country. The polity of the voting systems that we see in other jurisdictions has a different character to it. I welcome the character of the polity of our system of compulsory voting. But compulsory voting should not be a licence for passive democracy. It should not be the opportunity for a lazy franchise. If anything, it should be a reassertion by citizens of their need to engage with their responsibility to vote. We have to be very careful in this place to not do things that say, ‘If you cannot be bothered, if you do not make the effort, if you do not come along on the day, if you do not follow the rules of how to vote, you will be able to just somehow be let through the door anyway.’

We have rules around how democracy works, and rules around elections are incredibly important. People in this place have gone all over the world in times past and continue to do so today to observe the conduct of elections elsewhere. It is something we feel strongly about. It is something we commit our people to overseas to ensure that other countries can enjoy the same freedoms that we have in this country.

So why would we be contemplating lowering the bar on the obligations of our citizens who might otherwise seek a free pass when they will not take the steps that our laws require them to? This is what I think we risk here with the provision relating to the change to the close of rolls. The government has made this argument time and again—as have others outside this place, including various advocacy groups—and it was raised in the 2007 review of the election, and the numbers just do not support the argument. As the shadow minister said, in 2004, the AEC’s own submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters said that 168,394 people missed out on voting. In 2007, that number was 100,370. Australia’s democracy requires people to register to vote, as they should, by the time they turn 18 and to maintain their enrolment properly, as our law requires. If what was changed under the Howard government was such an assault on that right, then I would have expected to see those numbers showing the opposite, but they did not.

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