High Court overturns electoral laws

MARK COLVIN: It's been one of the speediest High Court cases in Australian history, and today the full bench of the court ruled that electoral laws brought in by the Howard government in 2006 were invalid.

As a result an estimated 100,000 voters who lodged their electoral enrolment forms in the week after rolls closed, will be able to vote in this year's federal election.

The political lobby group GetUp bankrolled the action. It says today's decision was a historic victory for Australian democracy.

The Federal Opposition says it's concerned that the decision leaves the door open to abuse by electoral rorters.

The Australian Electoral Commission in the meantime must scramble to process an extra 100,000 voters.

Paula Kruger reports.

PAULA KRUGER: Laws that required the electoral roll be closed the day the election writs were issued were introduced in 2006 by the Howard government.

Before that there had been a seven day window for voters to enrol or update their enrolment details.

The challenge to that law was launched by political advocacy group GetUp.

Hearings only started on Wednesday and today the full bench of the High Court declared by majority that law was invalid.


Sam Mclean is the communications director of GetUp.

SAM MCLEAN: The court found that that's unconstitutional because it in practise disenfranchises Australians. It limits their right to vote and therefore those laws have been struck down.

PAULA KRUGER: Were you optimistic of winning or was it the legal equivalent of a Hail Mary pass?

SAM MCLEAN: It was, um, we were certainly up against it. It was a long shot legal case but we're very, very excited that the full bench of the High Court has found in favour of those 100,000 Australians who will now be able to vote this election.

PAULA KRUGER: There were two plaintiffs in the case, one of whom was Doug Thompson. He had tried to update his enrolment details online through the Australian Electoral Commission, or AEC, website just before the deadline for the close of rolls.

But the website kept crashing, and it wasn't until the following day that he had found out he wasn't eligible to vote in 2010.

DOUG THOMPSON: It wasn't a political motive for me at all. I just thought that the current law was wrong. I didn't have enough time and I know heaps of my friends didn't either and I just jumped at the chance to get involved with something that would give people more time to be able to put themselves on the electoral roll or to change their details and make their vote count.

PAULA KRUGER: The Federal Government has welcomed today's High Court decision.

In a statement, Special Minister of State Joe Ludwig said the Government had tried to overturn the laws in Parliament but that effort was blocked by the Coalition.

GetUp says cutting the seven day grace period had a big impact on young people who were enrolling to vote for the first time, and in a close election the additional 100,000 votes could have a big impact.

The Federal Opposition says its 2006 decision to cut that grace period was to ensure the integrity of the electoral system.

Senator Michael Ronaldson, the shadow special minister of state, says he welcomes the additional voters in this year's election but says the Coalition will be taking a very close look at the reasons for the High Court decision when they are released later this year.

MICHAEL RONALDSON: This is not about overturning the High Court decision. We very much respect that and I said we welcome the additional voters who will come on. But it doesn't detract from the issues that we have in relation to the ability of the AEC to properly check people's bona fides prior to them having the right to vote.

And anything that undermines the integrity and the ability of the AEC to make those decisions and to do those investigations, in our view, undermines the integrity of the roll and if the integrity of the electoral roll is undermined then people lose confidence in the fact that their vote actually means something.

PAULA KRUGER: The AEC now faces the big challenge of getting more people on the electoral roll.

Spokesman Phil Diak says they still aren't exactly sure how many additional voters need to be enrolled.

PHIL DIAK: It's an estimated 100,000. We won't really know until we've processed all the additional enrolment claims in coming days and that's when we'll have a better idea.

PAULA KRUGER: And what is it that these voters will have to do differently compared to other voters when they go to the polls?

PHIL DIAK: Well those voters won't be on the lists which have already been printed and distributed. So it will be too late to include them on that. However, those voters will simply go to the polling place and they'll have a declaration vote.

Now to have that vote they will require an accepted form of proof of identity, for example a driver's licence, and we'll be providing that sort of information to all the affected electors. There are quite a range of acceptable documents, but you do need to produce that. It'll be a provisional vote in the overwhelming majority of cases that those electors will lodge.

PAULA KRUGER: The AEC says it will get in contact with every person who is now eligible to vote as a result of today's High Court decision.

MARK COLVIN: Paula Kruger.