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Duncan Webb: Labour justice spokesperson on planned voting law changes · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Right, Well, major changes are coming on how you can
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: vote in the general elections. The government's scraps same day enrollments,
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: meaning you must now enroll to vote before early voting starts.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: You're going to do that two weeks before election day,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: and free food, drinks and entertainment of voting booths will
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: also be banned. Labor says tens of thousands of people
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: will miss out on exercising their democratic right to vote
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  Speaker 1: as a result of today's changes. And Duncan web is
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Labour's just a spokesperson and joins you this morning, immantity
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: of Duncan.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: Good morning, Good for you.
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  Speaker 1: Now, why is this limiting democracy? A deadline is a deadline,
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  Speaker 1: whether it's on the day or two weeks beforehand. Just
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: go out there and enroll.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: Well, look, I guess the numbers speak for themselves. There
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: are one hundred and ten thousand people who didn't get
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: round to sorting out their enrollment prior to election day
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: for whatever reason, you know, busy people working, people looking
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: after kids inside. But and then they decide, gee, I
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: forgot that I want to vote. I'm going to go
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: down What do you know I can do it right here?
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: I think that those hundred and ten thousand people actually
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  Speaker 2: have as much right to have a say and who
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: runs the country as anyone else does.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: But there's an obligation when you get a vote, and
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  Speaker 1: one of those obligations is to enroll. And they obviously
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: didn't think much of the election and they weren't involved
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: in the democratic process if they couldn't get enrolled two
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: weeks before the election, there.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: Is an obligation to be enrolled. And you know, I'm
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: sure a lot of people appreciate that. When you're moving
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: houses and you know, you've got a lot on your mind,
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: you don't always think and I've got to get hold
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: of the Electoral Commission and let them know my new address.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Dunk in the letter and the ad campaign arrives months
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: before the election. You got plenty of time. Two weeks
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: is the deadline. Get You could have done it three
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: months ago before you were moving.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Oh, you know, the ad campaign's out there. Not everyone's
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: watching TV and looking at those kinds of things. But
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: you've got to remember these are people, mainly people who
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: have moved. So the letter, which sometimes doesn't arrive, but
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: often goes to the old address, not the new one.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: So there's all kind of administrative reasons why people might
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: not enroll to vote. And if you're going to say, well, look,
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  Speaker 2: if you're not onto it, you don't remember that you've
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: got to change your enrollment every time your move house,
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  Speaker 2: and a lot of people move houses frequently. Students are
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: a great example of that.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: Okay, well, there's a lot of people who are insinuating
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: that the reason you are defending the right to enroll
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: on the election day is because you believe later rollers
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: are left voters.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: Are you no, Look, I think this is about everyone.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: There's all kinds of reasons people will forget to change
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: their enrollment details. Some of them will be left, some
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: of them won't. But every single vote counts, and I'd
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: rather have an enrollment system where everyone gets a crack.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: They're one where you know, two electorates worth. Some people
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: don't get to vote because they weren't quite onto it.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Okay, what about the treating the food, the drink and
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: the entertainment. I mean that is actually a very mainor bribe,
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  Speaker 1: is it not.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: You look, the rules around serving food or drinks and
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: so on around the voting have always been a bit murky,
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: and we actually support it and recommended in the Select
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: Committee that there be some changes around us. So it's
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: really good clarification to say, look, one hundred meters of
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: a voting place, you can't be offering sausages or hungry
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  Speaker 2: or whatever it might be good.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Soeff Duncan, I thank you for your time this morning. Duncan,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Web Labor spokesperson.
• 3:20
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• 3:24
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• 3:27
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