El Presidente Howard is fixing the polls

A story claiming that a bill has been introduced into parliament at the instigation of the hard right which would make it more difficult to get onto the electoral roll. The presumed intention is to filter out younger and lazier voters as these tend to be left-leaning.

This is a disturbing move to be making in the aftermath of the Florida fiasco in the USA's last election in which a number of minorities (eg. poor, black etc.) were incorrectly excluded from voting in a marginal state election because of errors made by a hard-right Governor who also happened to be the brother of one of the candidates.

Initiatives apparently include:

making it more difficult for young people to enroll for the first time, [] closing down the rolls for new enrolments at the issue of the writs, instead of the usual seven days after, [] requiring provisional voters, including itinerants and aboriginals, to prove their identity at the polling booth, [] making assisted voting more difficult for the disabled and those who cannot read and write, and [] winding back the franchise for prisoners.

The author predicts a media campaign pushing electoral fraud as a big threat - possibly a terrorist threat - despite repeated electoral fraud comissions which have found nothing. And this is allegedly supposed to be pushed through parliament in an election year.

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