Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

I thank all those in the chamber who've contributed to the debate on the Electoral Legislation Amendment (Miscellaneous Measures) Bill 2020. I also take this opportunity to thank the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters for their thorough review of the bill and their even-handed examination of the issues raised in submissions. The committee found that the reforms in the bill will deliver important enhancements to our electoral system.

I also thank the committee for their recommendation for minor amendments to clarify key parts of the bill related to the interaction of electoral laws of different jurisdictions, consistent with the government's intent with this reform legislation. The government will move amendments that reflect that recommendation and we'll say more on those details during the in committee stages of the debate. I also foreshadow that the government is also willing to support an opposition amendment to the commencement date, as was proposed separately by the opposition members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. The Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 is one of the oldest pieces of legislation in Australia, and the reforms in this bill are important to help modernise parts of the electoral system and to assist the AEC to deliver effective and timely electoral events.

Many of the amendments in this bill were included in an earlier technical amendment bill in the last parliament. While those reforms were recognised at the time as necessary, they were carried across the current parliament so that the AEC could focus on the delivery of the most urgent machinery changes ahead of the 2019 federal election.

This bill contains numerous improvements. The most important among those are: it extends the confidential voting service to Australian voters working in Antarctica; it removes the requirement to designate some divisional offices as pre-poll centres where they are unfit for purpose, including lacking disability access; it helps contain the width of the Senate ballot by allowing candidate names to be printed underneath preference boxes instead of only alongside boxes; it clarifies the interaction between federal, state and territory funding and disclosure regimes; and it allows flexibility in wording of questions to help find a voter on the roll, which will better assist people with a non-English-speaking background or those with a hearing disability. In summary, these reforms will improve the operational efficiency of elections, remove overly prescriptive language in the act, improve services to particular disadvantaged or geographically remote voter groups and strengthen electoral integrity and administration.

I should say, having listened to the contributions to this debate, that as far as this bill is concerned it appears that most of the contributions have focused on the measures in this bill that clarify the interaction between federal, state and territory funding and disclosure regimes. The principle that the government is seeking to pursue is a very simple one, and that is that state laws should govern state elections and federal laws should govern federal elections; state laws should not govern federal elections. And I've got to say that I'm somewhat surprised by the strength of commentary from the Greens and even from my good friends and valued colleagues in Centre Alliance, because you're making all sorts of allegations, using offensive big words, in relation to a piece of legislation—