Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I wish to speak to the Special Minister of State's tabling of the Australian government's response to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters report Conduct of the 2022 federal election and other matters: interim report. I am also privileged to be a member of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, alongside my fellow South Australian Senator Marielle Smith, and I know that we both see this as a deeply important part of our work. The integrity of our electoral system is critical to a functioning democracy, and we've spent the last 12 months looking in depth at the issues that are facing our electoral system and the challenges that we all know are there but which some people refuse to accept are there.

One of the acute lessons that we are learning in this world is that the democracy that so many of us have enjoyed cannot be taken for granted. Our democracy is fragile. We have to protect it. We have to make sure that this is not just something that we set and forget. We must review after every election and learn the lessons of what has occurred. Democracy is built on trust—trust in institutions, trust in information and trust in our political structures—and we know that is being challenged. In a world where anyone can post for free on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, X, or whatever platforms are coming or going on the day, our challenge is to ensure a well-informed electorate. It is a far cry from the world that we were living in, say, 30 years ago or even 20 years ago, when information was a lot less prevalent but usually a little bit more targeted or controlled. What we are seeing now is that, with various algorithms and structures, all sorts of information circulates, and we need to ensure that that information is informing our electorates and that people are getting the information they need to understand how our democracy works, what various political parties or individuals are putting forward, and what they are offering for people to vote for.

The increased accessibility that we've seen can also be a really good thing. Having broader access to information can be excellent. But we do need some control. We do need some balances and checks to make sure that the information out there is critical and that it is relevant. One of the recommendations that the interim report put forward was on truth in political advertising. What we need to ensure is that people are never targeted in such a manner as to provide them with incorrect information or divert them from truth, reality or broader access to information. As a mature democracy, we have a role to play in countering any misinformation that may occur.

As South Australians, my colleague Senator Marielle Smith and I are very used to this, because South Australia has had truth-in-political-advertising laws since 1984, and the world has not ended. The sky did not fall in.

Despite all the clucking noises about how you can't do this and why you can't do this, you absolutely can put in place structures to deal with incorrect electoral information.

The Electoral Commission in South Australia can act on any material brought to their attention that contains a statement that's purported to be fact but is both misleading and inaccurate. They require a referral and then they can investigate where the reality sits. It's quite simple, it's quite straightforward, and, like I say, it has worked in South Australia for a considerable period of time. There are two key aspects to this. One is that the onus is on the complainant. Somebody has to put forward a complaint. It is not for the Electoral Commission to scan every ounce of material, which would be an epic task. It does shift the burden of the resources primarily to the people who wish to monitor these things—predominantly political parties, I would say—who then put in a complaint, which is then investigated. For a statement to be a breach, it must have been purported to be fact. There is no impact on statements of opinion or predictions of what might happen; it's just whether you're purporting something is fact when indeed it is not.

The second aspect is that the penalty is corrective. It places a burden on whoever provided the misinformation to correct it. In reality, it is a real disincentive. If you've sent 50,000 flyers out to the electorate with intentionally incorrect information on them—not an opinion but an incorrect 'fact'—you then have to send out another 50,000 to correct it. That's a huge disincentive, and we know from our experience in South Australia that it works. It's a huge disincentive and stops an enormous amount of bad behaviour. As I said before, the sky hasn't fallen in. We do have a thriving and healthy democracy and it cannot be hijacked by harmful behaviour.

One of the key recommendations in the interim report is to deal with this matter on a federal basis. I think I speak for the South Australians who have experienced this system when I say we know it can work. I'm really looking forward to seeing the final report released and seeing the government's response to it. I would like to take this opportunity to recognise that the Special Minister of State, Senator Don Farrell, has spent many, many years on improving our democracy, our system of governance, and working towards the most robust democratic process that we can possibly find to run elections in this country.

Obviously, that's not the only thing in the report. The report deals with a whole range of issues around donations and caps that have been discussed for years. It's about time something was done about them. One issue we face is the difference between an electorate voting on the basis of their beliefs and the constructs they believe someone is going to bring forward as their representative—something they believe in and can get alongside—and the buying of votes. There have been many media stories and disclosures about how much money was spent on the last election—how much money various individuals donated. The concept of real-time donation disclosure is about seeing how many millions of dollars person X has donated to party X or how many millions individual A has donated to individual B so that there's clarity and you understand exactly what's going on: who's funding what. What is it that you are seeing? Are you seeing the ideas of an individual, are you seeing the ideas of a party, or are you seeing what can be bought with the cold, hard cash of a wealthy person or wealthy corporation?

I am very much looking forward to the final report of JSCEM and the government's response. I commend you to read the report. It is well worth it. It is very informative. We must protect our democracy and that includes improving our electoral system and working towards the most balanced and fair system that we can possibly achieve.