Restricting Democracy

In proposed changes to the Commonwealth Electoral Act the conservative federal government is proposing to restrict the ability of Australian's to exercise their right to vote and at the same time protect those who wish to influence the political process through financial donations to political parties.

Among the changes is a reduction in the time, after the announcement on an election, that the person has to enroll to vote or update their details on the roll. The time reduction to come into effect from 2007 is down from several days to several hours. This has been highlighted by the recent snap election announcement in Queensland where some people thought they may have been caught out by the legislative changes. The change particularly effects young voters who may not have enrolled to vote and those who have shifted house since the last election and may not have updated their electoral roll address details. This potentially disenfranchises hundreds of thousands of voters.

Another significant change in the legislation is the raising of the threshold for anonymous donations to political parties from $1,500 to $10,000. As well, closely related parties (i.e., members of the same family) are treated separately, as are donations to different state and territory party branches. As a result, a rich family could secretly donate hundreds of thousands to a party. A report from the parliamentary library indicates that based on 2004-5 figure as much as $8 million in donations would become anonymous. To add insult to injury, the tax free threshold for political donations has been increased from $100 to $1500 per annum. This effectively moves millions of dollars from the common wealth to political parties.


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