Tony Smith (Casey, Liberal Party, Deputy Chairman , Coalition Policy Development Committee) Share this | Hansard source

Of course how that will work in practice is, as so many members on this side of the House have indicated, very open to question. I say to the member for Moreton that this is a serious debate. I know it is customary to interject, but we are not at two o'clock yet—it is not question time. I am glad the member for Moreton is still with us, since we are talking about elections. He was on the verge of calling a by-election. These are bad laws. They are laws which Labor think, in their heart of hearts, will favour them. They think that if they can enrol people who do not want to enrol, if they can update addresses of those who have not updated them—in other words, if they can take action on behalf of that small percentage of Australians who do not want to vote—that may somehow give them electoral advantage. These are bad bills and we are opposing them here and in the other place. As our shadow minister the member for Mackellar pointed out just yesterday, these bills will compromise the integrity of the Australian electoral roll. We hope they do not pass; we suspect they will. If they do, they should not become part of the fabric of our electoral system, which has served our country so well.

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