Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

We are still dealing with government amendments, which are all designed to introduce a form of option preferential voting below the line. I seek leave to move government amendments (3) to (9) on sheet JP109 together.

Leave not granted.

I move amendment (3) on sheet JP109:

(3) Schedule 1, page 6 (after line 19), after item 21, insert:

21A Paragraph 268(1)(b)

  Repeal the paragraph, substitute:

  (b) subject to sections 268A and 269, in a Senate election, it has no vote indicated on it, or it does not indicate the voter's first preference for 1 candidate and then consecutively number at least 11 other candidates in the order of his or her preference;

21B After section 268

  Insert:

268A Formal votes below the line

(1) A ballot paper in a Senate election is not informal under paragraph 268(1)(b) if:

  (a) the voter has marked the ballot paper in accordance with paragraph 239(1)(b); or

  (b) if there are more than 6 squares printed on the ballot paper below the line—the voter has consecutively numbered any of those squares from 1 to 6 (whether or not the voter has also included one or more higher numbers in those squares).

(2) For the purposes of this Act:

  (a) a voter who, in a square printed on the ballot paper below the line, marks only a single tick or cross is taken as having written the number 1 in the square; and

  (b) the following numbers written in a square printed on the ballot paper below the line are to be disregarded:

     (i) numbers that are repeated and any higher numbers;

     (ii) if a number is missed—any numbers that are higher than the missing number.

Note: Paragraph (2)(b) applies both for the purposes of determining whether a ballot paper is formal, and for the purposes of determining which numbers marked on a ballot paper are counted in the election.

Example:   A ballot paper has squares below the line that are numbered 1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5 and 6. The vote is informal because, by disregarding the numbers 3 and upwards under subparagraph (2)(b)(i), only 2 squares have been numbered.

  A second ballot paper has squares below the line that are numbered consecutively from 1 to 9 and then 11, 12, 13 and 14. The vote is formal under paragraph (1)(b). However, only the squares numbered from 1 to 9 are counted for the purposes of sections 273 and 273A because the numbers 11 and upwards are disregarded under subparagraph (b)(ii) of this subsection.

The CHAIRMAN: The question is that amendment No. (3) on sheet JP109 be agreed to.

The committee divided. [05:49]

(The Chairman—Senator Marshall)