Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Urban Development) Share this | Hansard source

The opposition will be supporting the Democrats’ opposition to schedule 1, item 14, of the bill, because if it succeeds then the provisions of the bill will be altered to the effect that it will protect the status quo. However, we will not be supporting Democrat amendment (2), because it goes further than the current circumstances. We have a situation here where the government is proposing to disenfranchise prisoners serving a sentence of imprisonment of three years or more. There are 9,861 prisoners in that category. The additional measures that the government is seeking under this bill effectively disenfranchise all prisoners, some 19,000 people. As I read it, because people are enrolled in the electorates in which they lived prior to their imprisonment it would not necessarily have a great impact on any particular electorate. So in practical terms I cannot see that it has any particular measures associated with it. I do not think the government has explained its case, and I ask the minister: does this provision affect those who are on remand—