One of the most important abuses of its Senate majority by the Coalition has been the changes to electoral legislation, the results of which Andrew Bartlett called at the time “disenfranchising voters by closing the rolls early”. It’s interesting, then, to have a look at a recent paper [pdf] from Simon Jackman and Peter Brent. The paper is part of the ANU Democratic Audit of Australia:
Our story is fairly simple: the Australian Electoral Commission has become more proficient at expunging voters from the roll while at the same time changes in legislation have made it tougher to get on and stay on the roll.
Certainly not my experience. We moved recently and last weekend someone from the AEC turned up at the house to check enrolment as they had no-one there. As it happens, we had recently enrolled at the new address and she was using an old list, but I thought that at least shows the AEC is trying to keep the rolls up to date.
What Mr Reynolds said!!
It ain’t that hard to enrol or stay enrolled.
My experience in changing address has been to get numerous AEC Re-enrollment forms from different sources.
This is a non-issue.
If you can’t get enrolled and stay enrolled to vote then you obviously don’t hold the right and priviledge as important.
SHeesh - you can even Pre-enrol if under-eighteen if it so important to you.
The Liberals would rather no one vote and they just got to stay in power indefinitely.
Failing that, they would prefer that non-Liberal voters do not vote .. so they can stay in power indefinitely.
The main issue with the changes is that people will have only a few hours to ensure they’re enrolled, or correctly enrolled after an election is called. The rolls will close at 8pm on the day that the writs are issued. In the last election, 78000 people enrolled or corrected their enrolment in the week after the election was called.
If I were to guess from the truncated graph, enrollment regularly peaks before a federal election, so enrollments are probably catching up right now.
BTW, if you’re 17 I’m pretty sure you can pre-enroll for your 18th birthday.
Someone may as well add to this thread, you can go to AEC’s Enrollment Verification Page to check your details whenever you want.
Interesting aside, is the story of someone who didn’t want to be on the electoral roll, applied for a security clearance, and had it rejected because he was not in the roll.
Not surprising Fozzy - not being on the roll is (prima facie) an offence. Security clearance normally excludes those guilty of an offence.
.
Kim,
On the enrolment question generally. As above, and to partially echo Razor, it is an offence not to be on the roll. I have been into the AEC offices in the lead up to an election and those people are completely, manically, busy. The added weight of having to process (on your figures, which I accept) an additional 78,000 forms for those who could not be bothered to comply with the law previously merely adds to the burden.
To be honest how much difference does it make in any case? On your figures again - it is only about 5-600 votes per seat and very very few seats ever get that close and in even fewer does the government hang on that.
I would obviously prefer that everyone has a full and fair say in the government of this country - but not at any cost. The vast majority in this country manage to keep their enrolment sufficiently up to date. It is never going to be perfect, however and it is just a matter of how much you pay so that that last person can exercise their right to vote.
The critical thing is that they are given a full and fair opportunity to do so. I believe it is sufficient that:
1. They are told they need to enroll
2. They can get the enrolment form form just about anywhere
3. It is easy to fill in (even I can do it)
4. They are given enough time
3 years between elections is enough. The extra week, given the added cost burden to the AEC and the low number of extra enrolments, is (IMHO) not needed.
Andrew, there’s no efficiency argument. It’s the difference between:
1. the AEC officials updating the roll being 78,000 forms more busy, and
2. the polling booth attendants on polling day dealing with 78,000 people cross to find out they can’t vote.
Agree in principle. Bring on fixed Parliamentary terms.
“It ain’t that hard to enrol or stay enrolled.”
Easy enough to say, except the last time the AEC did this we weren’t home and got removed from the roll and only discovered so when we went to vote.
How often should I be expected to check my enrollment in case the AEC remove me from the roll because I wasn’t home when it suited them?
FdG, the efficiency argument reminds me of my boss in my first job in the Qld public service back in the 80s. He’d had a sideways transfer from his previous gig as head honcho of the State Electoral Commission, perhaps because he’d been in the habit of taking sick leave as soon as an election was called.
Andrew, the AEC takes on a lot of temporary staff around election time. It’s not administratively impossible to deal with enrolments. If we’re to have compulsory voting, it’s a duty and not just a right and one that ought to be facilitated by the government. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to suggest that a lot of people who don’t follow politics avidly have their memory jogged by the actual announcement of an election, and I see no good argument why their desire to vote should then be frustrated.
Polly,
If correct procedures were followed it would also have to have included several letters and a follow up visit. They would also normally have to have a trigger - a mail redirect is the normal one.
.
There is an efficiency argument - check the roll, explain they are not on it and give them a form as against all the procedures to get someone on the roll. No contest.
Mark,
It is obviously not impossible to deal with this at election time - we have been doing it for years. The question is whether we should be doing it. Given the low likelihood of it affecting the outcome and the high cost and lowered competence (to be frank) of temporary staff I do not believe we should. (And just to forestall any howls about temps - they are great, but bringing them up to speed when things are maniacally busy is yet another load on the permanent staff. This either results in less work by the perms on their days jobs or lowered efficiency from the temps, or, more frequently, both).
Personally, and on balance, I believe we should end compulsory enrolment and attendance at polling booths on the day - but that is another issue.
If we wanted to ensure all were enrolled we could - it would just cost a fortune. This whole thing is about striking a balance between cost and benefit. Tooz’s conspiracy theory aside, I think the balance is correct here.
What sort of cost are we talking about, Andrew? I can’t imagine it’s massive in the scheme of things when it comes to the Federal budget. Do we value people’s desire to vote?
Mark,
Very few individual line items are massive when it comes to the federal budget - navy frigates, Super Hornets and Parliament Houses aside.
You would have to ask the AEC for the numbers and of course we value their desire to vote. How much do they value it, though, if a personal visit from the AEC, several reminder letters etc. is not enough to get them to do it before the election?
Andrew, deserving and efficiency are two quite different issues.
I can back up pollytickedoff’s story with one of my own: I was doorknocking in the seat of Parramatta before the 2001 election and met a family who’d been deliberately unenrolled by the State Member (who shall remain a nameless waste-of-space arsehat).
They’d been getting heaps of direct mail addressed to the previous tenant, and no amount of RTS stamping changed the MP’s list details. Finally one of them took a bundle of letters around to the electorate office and gave the poor EO a serve, telling him that the people there didn’t live there anymore and that they should update their details from the roll.
The Member notified the AEC that the house was unoccupied—knocking off the roll this family who’d enrolled themselves correctly.
Assuming they were, um, actual people Kim. I was one of the much-derided AEC temps when I became politically homeless in the late ’90s. I had to check complaints of people being enrolled at “Unit 12, XX Whatever Street”, and when I got there I found only 10 units in the building. Another guy lived at 112/XXX Queen Street, and when I got there I found a newsagent with mailboxes out front (I stuck a note in Box 112, but the voter never called. Perhaps he was too cramped in there to read his mail).
In the 1999 elections in NSW, all that was needed for a change of government was for 1500 voters to change their minds. Not hard for either of the major parties to rort that, if they set their minds to it.
This works so well in the United States, where dysfunctional Presidents and Congresses just twist in the wind until eighteenth-century political machinery cranks them to the executioners. Any parliamentary party worth their salt would have pole-axed Bush by now. Likewise, imagine if Gore could have forced Clinton out in the late ’90s and gone into the 2000 election as President. If fixed terms are the answer, you’re asking the wrong question.
Andrew,
With the rolls to close at 8pm on the day the election is called, it doesn’t seem to me that condition 4 of your post is being met ie.
There are many valid reasons why people may not even be aware of an election being called during that time period, and it seems unreasonable to disenfranchise people in such a context - particularly when I would venture a guess that the “$avings” generated by this exercise are trivial in terms of the cost of a Federal election.
If the cost is, indeed insignificant to enroll 78000 out of the total of (guess) 7-8 million, then it seems clear to me that other motives/justifications for such a change to the Act must be found, and Kim’s premise seems as good a description as I have heard.
Indeed, considering the character of the architect(s) the changes, it is an almost inevitable conclusion that they were made in an effort to seek electoral advantage.
Ah, the circular logic I’ve come to love around here.
Andrew,
With the rolls to close at 8pm on the day the election is called, it doesn’t seem to me that condition 4 of your post is being met ie.
There are many valid reasons why people may not even be aware of an election being called during that time period, and it seems unreasonable to disenfranchise people in such a context - particularly when I would venture a guess that the “$avings” generated by this exercise are trivial in terms of the cost of a Federal election.
If the cost is, indeed insignificant to enroll 78000 out of the total of (guess) 7-8 million, then it seems clear to me that other motives/justifications for such a change to the Act must be found, and Kim’s premise seems as good a description as I have heard.
Indeed, considering the character of the architect(s) the changes, it is an almost inevitable conclusion that they were made in an effort to seek electoral advantage.
PS I tried to send this at 5 pm, but WP is down !!
“How much do they value it, though, if a personal visit from the AEC, several reminder letters etc. is not enough to get them to do it before the election?”
A personal visit, however no card was left saying they had been there. No letter from them AT ALL, let alone several of them!
On previous occassions when the AEC has done a roll check and no-one was home they have left a card asking to confirm/amend details and return to them.
I have been on the electoral role from the day I turned 18 and whenever I have moved my enrollment has been the second thing to be done (the first is getting the utilities connected).
That is why I was particularly P’d off to have been removed, because I DO value my right to vote!
It must have been one of those temps I’ve been reading about!
CraigMc
Please point out where such logic is used ? I argued a point, then made an (independent) expression of my personal opinion - which played no part in my argument.
Perhaps you are unable to address the points I made ?
Efficiency should not be a primary factor in deciding how the democratic process is conducted. It should be a fair way down the list, in my opinion.
Adam,
How much should the taxpayer fork out for that last, marginal vote then? $100? $1,000? $1,000,000? Should we alter it depending on whether the electorate is safe or not?
.
Pterosaur,
The roll (at least in WA) is used for a lot more than just elections - jury duty for one. The simple fact remains that, whether we like it or not it is a legal obligation that, if we are eligible, we need to be on it. People who are not are breaching the law - and neither major party is seeking to change that.
For them to complain that they had no notice of the election so that they had a chance to comply with a legal obligation that has existed since they last moved is not, IMHO, a sound grounds for complaint. They have had plenty of time to comply - all the time since they last moved.
Pollytickedoff’s position is different, and, from the facts given obviously incorrect, but it is different from the main point here as she believed she was registered.
“Pollytickedoff’s position is different, and, from the facts given obviously incorrect”
I beg your pardon????????????????
I think I KNOW when I have been disenfranchised through no fault of my own, thank you very much.
I resent the implication that I am lying!
Having some sort of enrollment deadline might be alright if we had fixed terms and people knew when the election was happening… but we live in a system where the Government effectively can call an election whenever they want. The average citizen is not likely to be able to predict if a double dissolution was imminent, and can’t second guess the electoral calculus of the PM. Imagine if these rules were in effect in 1998, and all those counting on a March 99 election were sidelined just because Mr Howard consulted the auguries and figured October 98 was better? Australians can’t be blamed for being jolted into attention when an election is called… because that’s effectively the only signal we can count on.
The law has effectively created an imbalance. We can’t enrol after an election is called, yet we are uncertain as to when the election will be called. Either can the laws, or legislate for regular and predictable election periods.
I would guess that most of the people who had to enroll post the election being called are first time voters. Certainly, like others in this post, I’ve found the AEC to be quite enthusiastic about getting me to update my enrollment details whenever I’ve moved. They certainly don’t like houses having no enrolled people at all!
Why not tie enrollment (provisional for those under 18) with people applying for drivers licences and proof of age id cards? You’d pick up a whole lot more people automatically.
While I’m discussing matters of representative democracy, I should also add that instead of giving the GG power to dismiss the Gov’t in ‘75 style situations, their power should be limited to triggering a general election. The people, not the crown, are supposed to be the real sovereigns, after all.
Some time ago I had exactly the same experience as Pollytickedoff.
Just sayin’
Yes - and me. A person I lived with, for some strange reason, told the AEC she lived there, so did my partner but that I didn’t. So I got taken off the roll without my knowledge. This was not the AEC’s fault.
Pollytickedoff,
Apologies if you thought I implied you were lying - I meant no such thing. I would also encourage you to read Anna’s excellent piece on “Charity”, above.
All I mant by that was that I have no personal knowledge of the situation presented, but, on its face, you are right. No more than that.
.
Cliff,
The law has created no imbalance. You have an obligation under the law to be enrolled even if there is no election. No imbalance - you need to be enrolled. The trigger to update your enrolment is not the election - it is the fact of you moving house or becoming old enough to vote. Simple.
I like the idea of enrolling with the driver’s license, though.
On 1975 - that is what happened. The only other thing Fraser was allowed to do other than recommend an election was to get supply through so that government would not shut down and the election could be paid for. That was all. After supply was passed through the Senate Fraser recommended an election and the new government immediately went into caretaker mode.
Perhaps (and this may already be the case) there should be an offence of making a false statement to the AEC in relation to your own or someone else’s enrolment. The thought of a reasonable fine tends to concentrate minds wonderfully.
Okay, but then there is an imbalance between having an obligation under law to be enrolled, and not being allowed, under law, to enrol. And given that the whole point of being enrolled is to vote in an election, it would likewise seem odd that the only time a person (obligated as he is under law to enrol) is, under law, not able to enrol, is in the weeks leading up to an election.
Point taken, words eaten.
Which the slimy bugger was perfectly capable of doing anyway.
If you can’t foresee an election coming then I suggest you are probably politically unaware and don’t give a stuff about voting.
Andrew:-
“Apologies if you thought I implied you were lying - I meant no such thing.”
Fair enough, sorry if I misunderstood.
“I would also encourage you to read Anna’s excellent piece on “Charityâ€?, above.”
Are you now trying to imply I couldn’t accept that there was a misunderstanding?????
I had read it and pretty much agree with her post to the extent that once someone has said ‘I didn’t mean it that way’ you should accept that.
Hope you can accept I did genuinely misunderstand
In the case of the error that had us removed from the roll it would appear under the new rules that were it to happen again it is possible I would have only a matter of hours to check my enrollment, get the forms, get them witnessed and then send them. Doesn’t seem fair or reasonable to me.
Pollytickedoff,
I was just making a plea to read what I said with charity. I always try to assume others are not lying, but I also do not assume that what is said in a blog comment / post would stand up under cross-examination in a court.
.
Cliff,
If Fraser had instructed/requested opposition Senators to allow supply without a change in government there would have been no election. Personally, and I know I would be in a small minority here, I believe his actions justified - as the subsequent election confirmed.
Just a real pity he did nothing with the mandate he was given and governed as an old style conservative squatter instead of the liberal he claimed to be.
Plus - I agree on the slimy bugger bit.
Andrew,
seems to me you are the one not reading with ‘charity’ in mind, given you feel the need to respond to my post accepting I had misunderstood in such a way.
“but I also do not assume that what is said in a blog comment / post would stand up under cross-examination in a court.”
I wasn’t aware this was the standard of ‘evidence’ you required.
I was only pointing out that mistakes can happen (thankfully the AEC is pretty good, so it isn’t common) that can result in voters being removed from the roll through no fault of their own.
Surely worth considering in the context of the discussion?
Pollytickedoff,
I do not mean to imply that you are telling any less than what you understand to be the gold standard, unabashed truth. Not at all. The reason I use the phrasing I do (”from the facts given”) is that I have no way of, nor, to be honest, any real interest in, testing this. I just did not want to state that the AEC had done any less than their job or done anything incorrect without any evidence other than a blog comment or two.
I know several people in the AEC and in electoral offices and, in general, they do the best job they can under (sometimes) trying circumstances and for me to say they had definitely made a mistake on the basis of a blog comment would, to me at least, do them an injustice.
“from the facts given obviously incorrect”
“what you understand to be the gold standard, unabashed truth.”
Sorry, I no longer believe I did misunderstood your original post.
I agree the AEC do a pretty good job. They are not, however, infallible, even if you do know a couple of people that work there.
The AEC at least admit they can make mistakes and try to implement measures to try and ensure they don’t recur.
I well know they are not infallible, but I do not know the facts of your case beyond those you have presented. For me to make some form of conclusive statement or a judgement on that basis would be unjust (IMHO). I am simply avoiding saying they are definitely wrong and that you are definitely right. That is all. No insult, gainsaying or anything else intended to anyone at all.
Andrew - when in a hole, stop digging (bashes self over head).