Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / The AEC's Geoff Bloom on why the NT had one of the lowest voter turnouts ever this year

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The AEC's Geoff Bloom on why the NT had one of the lowest voter turnouts ever this year · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And we know the Australian Electoral Commission figures showed just
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: two and three people in the seat of Lingiari, which
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: blankets all of the Northern Territory outside of Darwin, cast
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  Speaker 1: a ballot in the recent federal election. Now Anthony Albanezi,
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  Speaker 1: the Prime Minister, yesterday labeled the figure an outrage and
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  Speaker 1: blamed it directly on cuts to the Commission resources under
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  Speaker 1: the former coalition government. The voter turnout in Lingiari has
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  Speaker 1: been described by the Australian Electoral Commission as disappointing and
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  Speaker 1: as I said, only two out of three voters casting
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  Speaker 1: that vote, but despite what was a huge effort by
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  Speaker 1: the Australian Electoral Commission. Now joining me on the line
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  Speaker 1: to talk a little bit more about the situation is
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  Speaker 1: Jeff Bloom, the Australian Electoral Officer for the Northern Territory.
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  Speaker 1: Good morning to you.
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  Speaker 2: Jeff, Good morning Katie.
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  Speaker 1: Jeff. What are those official numbers when it comes to
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  Speaker 1: the voter turnout for Lingiari.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, so, as you just said, the turnout in Lingyari
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  Speaker 2: is a little bit down on what it was in
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  Speaker 2: twenty nineteen, so it's sitting around sixty seven percent. It
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  Speaker 2: was around seventy three percent in twenty nineteen, so there
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  Speaker 2: has been a drop off also a small decrease in
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  Speaker 2: the division of Solomon as well, seventy three percent in
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  Speaker 2: twenty nineteen down to seventy percent or thereabout for this election.
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  Speaker 1: And Jeff, what do you attribute that drop too?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I think there's a few things in play here.
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  Speaker 2: And notwithstanding that, it appears provisionally, at least anyway, the
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  Speaker 2: national turnout is down somewhere in the order of two
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  Speaker 2: to three percent as well, so it looks like it's
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  Speaker 2: more widespread. But certainly, in terms of these COVID times
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  Speaker 2: that we live in now, the unpredictability about people being
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  Speaker 2: able to in this particular case get to a polling place,
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  Speaker 2: not that there weren't the same number of polling places
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  Speaker 2: and the same service offering for this election as we
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  Speaker 2: had in twenty nineteen. We certainly had all of those
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  Speaker 2: polling venues open, all of those services available, including postal
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  Speaker 2: votes and so on. But the uncertainty I think as
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  Speaker 2: perhaps perhaps kept people away, including people becoming all themselves
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  Speaker 2: through COVID or being close contacts. So there's a few
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  Speaker 2: unknowns in there, but certainly it has affected the turnout,
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  Speaker 2: and that's as you mentioned earlier. I've already stated that
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  Speaker 2: is disappointing for us because we've put in a huge effort.
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  Speaker 1: Jeff, is it a situation where there are some locations
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  Speaker 1: where there was lower voter turnout than others? Ie? Is it?
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  Speaker 1: You know? Is it remote voters that didn't turn out
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  Speaker 1: in the volumes that we're expecting or hoping for.
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  Speaker 2: It's not. No, the numbers there, the differences are not
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  Speaker 2: contained exclusively in the remote area mobile polling. So in
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  Speaker 2: the remote communities we are within ten percent of the
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  Speaker 2: number of votes issued in twenty nineteen across the remote
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  Speaker 2: community one hundred and seventy locations thereabouts, so within ten
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  Speaker 2: percent of the votes, and that in itself was really pleasing,
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  Speaker 2: because if we think back to the start of the
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  Speaker 2: journey and delivering our service to those remote locations is
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  Speaker 2: very difficult, very challenging, and of course with COVID in communities,
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  Speaker 2: we weren't even sure if we were going to go
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  Speaker 2: to the vast majority of those locations. So to get
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  Speaker 2: that outcome and come within ten percent of the votes
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  Speaker 2: issued in twenty nineteen was pleasing. What we did see
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  Speaker 2: is a drop off in people attending polling places on
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  Speaker 2: polling day, so the static polling places that as we
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  Speaker 2: call them. So we were hoping that because we could
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  Speaker 2: see that the numbers were already a little bit down.
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  Speaker 2: So through the early voting and the number of postal
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  Speaker 2: votes that we issued as well, we could see that
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  Speaker 2: the numbers were not looking all that great and we
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  Speaker 2: were hoping for that turnout on polling day. That didn't occur.
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  Speaker 2: So the assumption is that for some reason or other
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  Speaker 2: people just couldn't get to a polling place. And again
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  Speaker 2: there may be something to do with health issues. We
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  Speaker 2: don't know, but yeah, certainly with the effort that we
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  Speaker 2: put in significant as it was, we would have hoped
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  Speaker 2: for more people casting their both we know that.
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  Speaker 1: You know the Prime Minister yesterday weighed in on that
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  Speaker 1: debate and felt as though, you know there was a
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  Speaker 1: situation where cuts to the Australian Electoral Commission had had
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  Speaker 1: an impact. Is that the case.
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  Speaker 2: Well, those cuts to the Northern Territory Office were in
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  Speaker 2: twenty seventeen and they certainly had an impact at that
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  Speaker 2: time in terms of continuity of some of the services,
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  Speaker 2: including services to remote community. So our Indigenous electric participation program.
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  Speaker 2: That is true. We've since recruited a team, an indigenous
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  Speaker 2: team here, but that was in twenty twenty one, So
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  Speaker 2: that lack of continuity could we argued that we were
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  Speaker 2: behind and playing a bit of catch up there. I
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  Speaker 2: certainly wouldn't dispute that. But the teams, then, they have
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  Speaker 2: worked hard over the last few months in the lead
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  Speaker 2: up to the election, and of course there's a lot
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  Speaker 2: of work for them to do as we move forward
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  Speaker 2: in the next electoral cycle.
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  Speaker 1: Jeff, I know that you and your team, as you've
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  Speaker 1: pointed out, put in an enormous amount of effort to
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  Speaker 1: try to get as many Territorians out to vote as possible.
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  Speaker 1: Do you feel disappointed then that those numbers are so low.
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  Speaker 2: Well, the effort that we've put in, like the twelve
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  Speaker 2: months of planning that goes into this or more if
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  Speaker 2: we call it back in time, twelve months of planning
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  Speaker 2: as a minimum. You know, nine hundred polling staff that
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  Speaker 2: we recruited, and that's not easy. Again, noting that there's
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  Speaker 2: not a lot of people looking for a job right now,
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  Speaker 2: training those people, getting them into those polling places, delivering
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  Speaker 2: the service, a huge amount of effort. Very tired people.
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  Speaker 2: I have to say here seems like a long time
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  Speaker 2: ago that the rits issued back on the eleventh of April.
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  Speaker 2: It's around sixty days since those rits were issued. So
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  Speaker 2: the efforts, the communication that the agency did, more broadly,
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: the messaging TV ads, radio ads, social media, and we
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  Speaker 2: put an official guide into every elector's postbox, letterbox. Big effort,
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  Speaker 2: and unfortunately now the turnout is not what we hoped
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  Speaker 2: it would be.
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  Speaker 1: If are the people who didn't turn up to vote
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  Speaker 1: going to be fined.
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  Speaker 2: There is what we call a non voter process after
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  Speaker 2: each federal election, and as we do after every election,
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  Speaker 2: we look at the process itself. We do write to
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  Speaker 2: people who have not voted so their name has not
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  Speaker 2: been marked off the electoral role, and we ask them
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  Speaker 2: to provide a reason as to why they didn't vote.
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  Speaker 2: I think that will be interesting this time around us
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  Speaker 2: to some of the reasons, whether it is something to
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  Speaker 2: do with illness or being a close contact and so forth,
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  Speaker 2: or just their comfort level around going to a polling
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  Speaker 2: place where despite the COVID measures that we had in
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  Speaker 2: place to make those polling places to say this possible,
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  Speaker 2: people not feel comfortable going to a polling place. All
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  Speaker 2: of those things will become visible once we get those
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  Speaker 2: responses from people, So the l will occurred in the
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  Speaker 2: months ahead, certainly before the end of the year.
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  Speaker 1: Could it be a situation where the Electoral Commission has
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  Speaker 1: done everything that they can to try to get people
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  Speaker 1: to vote, but unfortunately some Territorians just aren't really interested
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  Speaker 1: in the people that have put their hand up to run.
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  Speaker 2: I know there's some external commentators that have got some
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  Speaker 2: theories about people being disconnected from the political process or
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  Speaker 2: the democratic process, and of course we can't necessarily comment
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  Speaker 2: on that. We don't know. We are the service delivery
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  Speaker 2: side of the business and that's what we do and
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  Speaker 2: we believe we've done a very good job there. But
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  Speaker 2: there's certainly some other commentrary out there that may be
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  Speaker 2: born out in time, but certainly nothing that I could
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  Speaker 2: comment on specifically.
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  Speaker 1: Well, Jeff Bloom, the Australian Electoral Officer for the Northern Territory,
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  Speaker 1: We always appreciate your time. Thank you for having a
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  Speaker 1: chat with us this morning.
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: Thanks Katie, thank you