Crikey pundits have been duking it out over the NSW government’s plan to introduce automatic electoral enrollment. Is it really a “shameful encroachment on basic rights”, or just good bureaucratic process? William Bowe wraps the debate.
Australian Electoral Commission
Dust off your Smiths albums, it’s 1988 and the Australia Card all over again!
Stock up on the ammo and canned food! Bernard Keane’s conspiracy theories on electoral reforms are flat out wrong, says Peter Brent.
16-year-old wannabe voters get a boost
Here are the headline grabbers from the government’s electoral reform paper, says William Bowe: serious discussion of voluntary voting for 16-year-olds. And could resigning MPs suffer financial penalties?
School signs, spin and other half-smart Ruddy capers
The Government’s proclivity for spin and half-smart political strategy is re-emerging, with its signs-in-front-of-schools plan and attempts to sell award modernisation.
Tips and rumours: Imminent election?
In tips & rumours today: the best indicator of an imminent election has been the Electoral Commission checking if post offices have sufficient enrolment forms. They just checked.
Australia Council strikes as @kathyinvenice tweets
Staff at the Australia Council are striking, angry over reduced conditions and wages, writes Nicholas Pickard.
Redrawing the map: NSW redistribution game
Political parties have made NSW electoral redistribution submissions that propose a statewide redrawing of boundaries that subtly (or not so subtly) favour their own party’s interests, writes Ben Raue.
Tinkering with the electoral process: Liberal margin of error
Over the 11 years of the previous government, more and more Australians have been losing their most basic democratic right — their vote at a federal election, writes Michael Danby.
The hypocrisy of Michael Ronaldson
The Coalition are eager to sell the idea of widespread electoral fraud, writes Bernard Keane.
Mackerras: the WA redistribution that grew
‘I assumed it would be a pretty minor affair but I could not have been proved more wrong,’ writes Malcolm Mackerras.
Manildra’s fuel ethanol grant will increase inflation
Was there something other than altruism behind Manildra Group ‘s Dick Honan’s support for the democratic process? One of our website users suggests there just might be, writes Richard Farmer.
Richard Farmer’s view from Canberra
Meaty snippets from the home of government plus the daily reality check and the pick of other people’s political coverage. Richard Farmer writes.
Reforming FOI: a question of culture as much as law
If the federal government is committed to reforming freedom of information laws, will it run into a culture of secrecy within the public service? My experience over the past year suggests that, culturally, there’s a long way to go – within the Australian Electoral Commission at least, writes Peter Browne.
The Newhouse resignation letter that won’t be buried
The bizarre affair of Labor candidate George Newhouse’s candidacy in Malcolm Turnbull’s Sydney seat of Wentworth at the November Federal Election is still bubbling away very nicely, writes Alex Mitchell.
From the polling booth on the grassy knoll
There is no evidence of widespread, let alone systematic, electoral fraud in Australia. Try telling that to the H S Chapman Society, a stalwart band of conspiracy theorists, writes Christian Kerr.
Too close to call? The count continues
They think it’s all over? Well it isn’t … yet. The Australian Electoral Commission still has nine electorates on its Close Seats list., writes Christian Kerr.
More factional warfare looms for NSW Liberal Party
Stand by for a fresh eruption of factional warfare in the NSW Liberal Party at its State Council meeting on December 8, writes Alex Mitchell.
Two old Leaders keep their record
As votes get closer to being completely counted from last Saturday’s poll, two old leaders have kept their records by the narrowest of margins. Bob Hawke will no doubt be happier about it than Malcolm Fraser, writes Richard Farmer.
Election night ruckus threatens tally room’s future
Has the “no boring bits” approach to election night coverage from Seven and Nine killed off the idea of the central tally room in Canberra for future federal elections? asks Glenn Dyer.
The collective wisdom of Crikey
Far from being a mob of raving lefties, Crikey readers showed they are quite a conservative lot with their entries in our 2007 Federal Election Competition and quite good judges to boot, writes Richard Farmer.
Farmer: The parlous state of the Coalition
It tells us something about the state of the modern Liberal Party when you realise that Saturday’s election gave the Party its best share of the vote in its last nine election appearances, writes Richard Farmer.
What did the AEC say about electoral law changes? Don’t ask
We can’t tell you what our advice to the government was because it might be controversial. Essentially, that’s the response from the Australian Electoral Commission to a Freedom of Information request I made earlier this year, writes Peter Browne, editor of Australian Policy Online.
Ala Akba, as they say in the NSW Liberal party
There are few certainties in politics but it is odds-on that the NSW Liberal Party director Graham Jaeschke won’t be keeping his job after the federal election. On his watch, the NSW Liberal Party has failed to tame the far right fundamentalist Christian faction which has been encouraged during Prime Minister John Howard’s 11-year term […]
Are Liberal Facebook ads in breach of the Electoral Act?
The Liberal Party has been caught out apparently breaching Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) rules on political advertising, writes Julie Posetti.
