Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I too would like to comment on the Electoral and Referendum Legislation Amendment Bill 2006. I note that previous speakers have talked about its positive aspects. There are several very positive steps forward, particularly for those who are sight impaired. Technology is a wonderful thing, particularly when it is put to use to enhance people’s life experience and ability to participate in our democratic processes and to provide opportunities to improve people’s social inclusion. But today I would like to comment on some things we have had conversations with many members of the Canberra community about. These are the changes proposed in this bill with respect to closing the roll, the greater identity checks and the increased difficulty for people to get on the roll.

I think the real issue that needs to be understood here is that the Howard government has got real form on using laws such as the electoral laws for its own partisan benefit, and many of my colleagues have already made the comment that many of these laws are doing exactly that. We did some research here in the ACT, in my electorate, and found that under these new rules over 10,000 potential electors could have lost their right to vote in the electorates of Canberra and Fraser at the last election. That gives a sense of the magnitude of the change that is taking place. That is how many people needed to change their arrangements, or indeed get on the roll, post the issuing of the writs. I note that there is a three-day leeway, but it is still hard to say whether or not that will be enough time for people to update their addresses. I know that there would be a huge amount of work for the Electoral Commission to undertake and I know also that new enrollees would not be able to do that.

The thing about existing voters updating and changing their details and the increased identification checks that will be required just shows that it is about making it more onerous, particularly for young people. I think that the effort in this regard is to put up a higher barrier for people who are perhaps motivated to vote and to get on the electoral roll but not if the fence is put too high. I think that it is an effort to undermine what is an established principle, one that all but a few coalition people agree with: the principle of compulsory voting. We need to value that system; we do not need to make it harder for people to participate in it.

The other point that I would like to make about this approach is that when it comes to political donations the Labor Party believes that it is incredibly important to have the utmost transparency in the way political donations are made. I have often had this debate on the airwaves locally with my ACT Senate colleague, Senator Gary Humphries. A Liberal senator, Senator Humphries often says that he does not think there should be political donations at all to parties, and we have had a debate about that. My response is that we need to have political donations because that is part of how our system works, but we need to have them in the most open and transparent way possible. So I think that it is quite ironic that we are debating legislation that seeks to make it less transparent, yet my Liberal counterpart is arguing for no political donations at all. I think he has quite a bit to reconcile in his taking that position and his party putting forward this kind of legislation.

In moving about the Canberra community, we have paid particular attention to university campuses and to young people, because they are likely to be the most disenfranchised by the closing off of the roll and the issuing of the writs. At the show just last weekend here in Canberra we saw a number of young people come past the Labor Party stall. We had our enrolment forms there and we advised them that they ought to get on the roll if they are turning 18 because they will not have a chance to once they are prompted by the calling of an election. People are quite shocked when I explain the implications of this and what this government is doing. They feel that it is a trick, that they are being robbed of something potentially without due warning and without due opportunity to get themselves on the roll in the way that generations have before them. I guess that it is a salient reminder to people that you really cannot trust the Howard government.

We are supporting this bill because there is a lot that is good in it. But typically there are a few spiky bits the government insists on putting forward that I think will undermine our democratic processes into the future. This bill will serve as an ongoing reminder particularly to young people, I think, that they are right to be sceptical about the motivation of the Howard government on all matters electoral. They are right to assume in many cases that there is a partisan motivation behind its activities in legislating in this area and that this government will do all it can to be just a little bit tricky, a little bit sly, a little bit manipulative when it comes to enhancing its chances to win the next election.

Labor are not going to stand for that. We will show the government up when it is necessary and when there is something going on that is not fair in Australian society. Whilst ever they have the numbers in this place—and in fact the majority in both houses of parliament—all we have are our words, and the government can do what they like in terms of legislation. So Labor will continue to remind people throughout this election year that they do need to get on the electoral roll before the election is called. They do need to check their enrolment details if they have had a change of address. We know that the system of the Electoral Commission in trying to notify people or check to see whether people are on the roll if they do not get their returns is flawed and that people are being struck off the roll. We know that there are fewer people on the roll than there were previously and that there has been a far greater drop in the number of people enrolled than previously. All of these things point to something a little bit wrong with the system, a system that is specially designed for Australians by the Howard government. Labor will keep on being diligent. We will be reminding people of the antics of the manipulative government and we look forward to the next election when, hopefully, people will not be disenfranchised, because they have got the message that they need to get on the electoral roll early.