OUR DEMOCRACY IS AT STAKE !!!
On April Fools Day 2004 the Howard Government introduced an electoral bill into Parliament that could disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of electors who might not vote for the Coalition at the 2004 federal election (Electoral and Referendum (Enrolment Integrity and Other Matters) Bill).
Conventional wisdom on the hard right has it that left-leaning voters can be found not only in the ranks of the so-called latte-sipping "elites", but also amongst the young and the socially disadvantaged, the poor, the homeless, prisoners, and aboriginals. And they know who you are. MPs and political parties are provided with the electoral roll in electronic format, including all your personal details, and they match this data with any other database they can lay their hands on. They have you demographically mapped, and have a fair idea from polling booth records how you are likely to vote, especially if you are interesting enough to be enrolled in a marginal electorate.
The right wing ascendancy in this country is intent on fixing the federal electoral system to its advantage by amending the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 to remove as many politically incorrect voters from the roll as it can. Its easier to win an election when you can bias the electoral rolls in your favour. Just ask our PM’s mate, George W Bush, who profited greatly in Florida from rigged rolls that excluded many blacks and prisoners, not to mention a clapped out voting system, brow-beaten electoral officials, and a stacked supreme court. Voters better be very alert when Parliament resumes or we can kiss our world-class electoral system goodbye…
When this bill is debated in the next few weeks, you can expect such liberal luminaries as Eric Abetz, Nick Minchin, Jeannie Ferris and Christopher Pyne to spread alarm and confusion with their terrifying tales of electoral fraud. You will hear that "it is easier to enrol to vote than to hire a video at the local store", that the rolls are stacked with cats, dogs and other imaginary voters, that hackers have invaded the computers and that electoral staff are biased and incompetent. The sky is falling in, we must not cut and run, we must "tighten up" the electoral system (and sacrifice more of our hard-won rights), in order to prevent electoral terrorism from the usual suspects.
You will be told that the only way to avoid this impending electoral disaster is by making it more difficult for young people to enroll for the first time, by closing down the rolls for new enrolments at the issue of the writs, instead of the usual seven days after, by requiring provisional voters, including itinerants and aboriginals, to prove their identity at the polling booth, by making assisted voting more difficult for the disabled and those who cannot read and write, and by winding back the franchise for prisoners. In all the sound and fury about rampant electoral fraud which will accompany debate on this bill, and which will be echoed abroad by a lazy and compliant media, you will hear very little about the internationally recognised merits and strengths of our electoral system (Canada and the UK have recently reformed their electoral systems to mirror many significant aspects of Australian electoral law).
For nearly two decades a group of cranky old right-wing reactionaries from the leafy suburbs of Sydney, such as Dr Amy McGrath of the H S Chapman Society, and cheered on by Alan Jones, Christopher Pearson, Paul Sheehan, and Professor David Flint, have been leading the assault on the integrity of our electoral system, with a relentless avalanche of electoral fraud allegations after every election (none of which has ever been proved) and loopy suggestions for "reform" that would take the franchise back to the dark ages. This small but useful constituency has been carefully nurtured by the Howard Government and rewarded with sympathetic publicity through ministerial press releases and parliamentary committee hearings.
The H S Chapman Society is still apparently unable to cope with the bipartisan electoral reforms made in 1983 which included the creation of an independent statutory authority to administer elections and referendums, reduced political interference in boundary redistributions and campaign financing, and improved the franchise through various technical amendments, such as the introduction of division-wide and provisional voting. Dr McGrath and her friends want to roll back the electoral reforms of 20 years ago, which they argue, against history, has benefited one side of politics over the other. McGrath insists that the secret ballot must be watered down with the introduction of "limited vote tracing" to deter electoral fraud (which it wouldn’t), and that there should be a return to an "English village" model of enrolment and roll maintenance, where everyone knows everyone else on the electoral roll for their suburban area. That way no-one can have their vote counted until the lace curtain brigade gives the nod. So much for the voting rights of the great unwashed in this wide brown land.
Allegations of electoral fraud are made by Dr McGrath and her friends in voluminous submissions to every post-election inquiry by the parliamentary Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters (JSCEM). The Australian Electoral Commission has responded to each and every one of these allegations in minute detail, and its submissions are published on the AEC website, but the same old discredited allegations are repeated year after year and recycled without question through the media, predictably undermining public confidence in the electoral system. The Howard Government now sees its chance, having softened up the electorate during the 2001 JSCEM inquiry into electoral fraud, chaired by a very hungry Christopher Pyne, and is set to make major "reforms" to the electoral law that could seriously erode the franchise. Your franchise. And heaven help the various electoral authorities who will have to establish and administer the new law in such an irresponsibly short time frame before the 2004 federal election.
Fortunately, there are a few political heavy-weights in parliament who are awake to the pending Howard Government electoral fix, including ALP Senators Faulkner and Ray, and Democrat Senators Murray and Bartlett, who sit on the JSCEM from time to time, and we can probably expect some senior journalists, who can read a parliamentary submission, not to be snowed by what is about to hit the fan. For readers who might be interested in finding out how their electoral system is about to be comprehensively whacked by the Howard Government, the 2004 electoral bill is available on the Parliament House website, and relevant AEC submissions to the JSCEM can be found on the clunky AEC website under "parliamentary submissions" (see below)….
Taken From...
http://www.crikey.com.au/whistleblower/2004/06/11-0004.html
This is the most fucked thing I have ever read... I am going to find out if there is anything that I can actively do to protest against such changes. It would be devastating for our country, our democracy and our freedom.
