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Wednesday, 21 March 2012
Page: 3815

Mrs BRONWYN BISHOP (Mackellar) (18:22): The bills were referred to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters for consideration and investigation, and during that process the Electoral Commissioner gave evidence, in answer to a question of mine, that it was quite possible, as the Electoral Commission only writes to the new address and not to the address that is currently on the electoral roll, that indeed someone's address could be wrongly altered and when they turned up to vote at their normal place they would be unable to vote. Yet if somebody else was aware that the Electoral Commission had changed their address, they could go and vote for them in that different address. That means that the electoral roll is opened up to fraud. The answer to my question by the Electoral Commissioner was, 'Yes, that is factually true.' He wondered why people would have two addresses but he admitted that it was quite possible and that what I had said would result would. I ask the minister why he has not provided in this bill that the Electoral Commissioner is required to write to both the old address, which is the one that is existing on the electoral roll, as well as the new one which results from his consulting databases, which can come from any source, as the option is the Electoral Commissioner's to use any list he chooses. Why is he not required to write to both addresses?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Ms AE Burke ): The question is that the bill be agreed to.