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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 11 Hansard (28 November) . . Page.. 3265 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

The potential for electronic votes to be interfered with by someone who gets access to the relevant computer is quite high and could be harder to detect. We all know about the ability of computer hackers to get into and corrupt what are supposed to be secure computer systems and we certainly do not want this to happen to our elections. The problems that arose with the use of electronic voting in the recent US presidential elections should also be examined for any lessons for the ACT.

The proposal to extend electronic voting to the Internet raises the dangers of interference to even higher levels. The Greens do not support Internet voting at this stage because its security is far from proven. There is also great difficulty in knowing whether the person who is voting at the other end of the computer terminal is whom they say they are or that they are not voting under some duress. In our current system, with people having to attend a polling place and vote on the spot, there is much less chance of interference in the casting of votes and there is the opportunity to check people's identity.

There is also the issue with electronic voting that not everyone in the community is familiar with using computers. There should never be any compulsion on people to use computer screens to cast their vote. There is also the issue that the look of the ballot paper would be changed in its transfer from paper to screen. It may not be possible to fit all the details from a usual ballot paper onto one computer screen, which would necessitate some rearrangement of the ballot paper or some scrolling mechanism. This change could have some effect on voting patterns, particularly for those candidates who are not on the first screen and people have to scroll the screen to get to them.

I have been briefed by the Electoral Commissioner on the details of this proposal and it appears that he is approaching this task in a thorough manner to ensure that all sides of politics will have confidence in the outcome and that the potential problems can be eliminated. At the same time, though, there is still a lot of work to be done in establishing a viable system and I do not want this process to be rushed. The outcomes of elections are too important for the future governance of the ACT for a badly conceived election process to be used.

I am happy to accept a trial of electronic voting at a small number of polling places at the next election and for the electronic counting of votes to see how it all works in practice. I am worried, however, that by amending the Electoral Act this bill will allow for electronic voting on a permanent basis before we really know whether it is acceptable. I will therefore be proposing some amendments in the detail stage putting a sunset clause on these changes so that electronic voting can only be used for the next election and for any recounts before the 2004 election.

I will also be seeking to write into the Electoral Act a requirement to establish an electoral reference committee to oversee the development of electronic voting and for a review to be undertaken after the 2001 election. Depending on the outcome of this review, the government will be able to put forward further amendments to the act to provide for electronic voting in future elections. I am prepared to accept electronic voting, but only as a trial at this stage.

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