Wednesday, 5 February 2025

Electoral Matters Committee

Inquiry into the Conduct of the 2022 Victorian State Election

Pauline RICHARDS (Cranbourne) (10:23): I am pleased to have the opportunity to rise and discuss the Electoral Matters Committee report on the conduct of the 2022 Victorian state election. I note the member for Monbulk said that the report that she was contributing on was heavy. Well, this one comes in two volumes. I am going to attempt to dive in in a couple of minutes to both volumes and highlight a couple of issues. The three particularly from volume 1 that I am wanting to bring to the attention of the house are the issues of equipping the Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) with the staff it needs, managing poor behaviour by candidates and campaigners and the issue of whether the election is inclusive. I, like all of us, have a lot of views about the experience in Cranbourne. I just want to credential myself as having been helping out on polling booths since I was a child, back in the day, in Chisholm. I am able to reflect on the need, which I feel very strongly, to reduce the adversarial nature of voting for the constituents that I represent, and also I think importantly for the health of democracy.

First, to the issue with equipping the VEC with the staff it needs, some of my neighbours – the people who live in my street – have been working for the VEC, so I have particular affection and I think insight into how stressful that role can be, and I think that this report unpacks some really important elements of that. In fact those three particular elements that I am speaking to I believe will benefit the VEC and particularly the people who work there, partly because of the importance that they hold to democracy. The VEC need to be staffed properly, and knowing especially in the context of Victorian state elections when they will be held, they need to take the time to plan to make sure that there are enough staff there.

There was an issue in Cranbourne with the availability of ballot papers. That is outrageous. People were waiting in line, turning up, working long hours, as is common in the outer suburbs, waiting long times to vote, and to find out that there were not enough ballot papers was a real problem. That impacts on the staff inside, but particularly it impacts on the ability for people to have their democratic say.

Of course the poor behaviour by candidates and campaigners has been unpacked fully, and I would like to add my voice to that. Having said that, I have been doing help on elections for a long time and certainly going back into my childhood, and I would concur with the views of many in this chamber that the behaviour at this last election was the poorest I have seen in my time. I am going to pay credit to those in the Liberal Party, because the conversations I had with them were probably the most productive, perhaps the conversations with the minor parties less so. The excitement sometimes in the minor parties at being involved in a democratic process led to behaviour that intimidated voters, and I think that that is outrageous. When people come in to vote, especially in the context of Cranbourne, voting sometimes for the first time with great excitement, they are so excited to be able to have an impact and to be able to vote. To have so many people come up to them in a way that they perceived as aggressive reduced the ability of people who are with goodwill handing out a how-to-vote card to articulate the need to vote in a way that has their vote counted.

This gives me the opportunity to speak to one of the most important elements, which is how elections can be inclusive for people with disabilities. I am conscious that our scout hall is a loved scout hall but did not have the disability access that was needed. People were unable to go to the toilet. People with disabilities were coming in and having trouble accessing the polling booth. Particularly for people who have never voted before, we have to really step out of their way to make sure that their vote can be counted, that the vote can be valid. Having somebody say with excitement that they voted for the first time and put a cross next to my name is heartbreaking for me as a candidate but actually heartbreaking for them. We need to do better for our people who are voting for the first time. I commend this report and the work that was done.