[GD] If you ever do mount a court case asserting the validity the 1,2,3,3,3 votes, and need to use my JP-witnessed casting of a such a vote, and statutory declaration that I voted that way, and why, let me know. Anita has a copy of the text. [AL] Thanks. I doubt that the court will be interested in such a stat dec as there will be no dispute that large numbers of such votes were rejected as informal. (The swing to informal was about 0.3%). However statements of the reasons why people voted that way should be useful as part of an ongoing campaign. (If enough people don't opt out of working such a campaign :-) There has already been 1 court case, 3 days prior to polling day - initiated by Joe Bryant in NSW independently of Neither. The judgment is at the link in the subject line: http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/federal_ct/1998/1242.html The learned criminal reptile supported the AEC's ballot rigging by pretending that a voter who rejects more than one candidate is not expressing an order of preference. An appeal has already been filed by Wayne Levick of http://www.levick.com.au ("solicitors with attitude")and and an application for an urgent hearing was heard last week with judgment reserved and expected early next week). This information should of course be on the web site and announced for discussion in the mailing list. So should information about the extent of the informal swing and the several (at least 5) marginal seats that would presumably require a supplementary election if the AEC had not resorted to ballot-rigging. But as I have already mentioned, nobody is currently responsible for doing anything in particular about anything in particular. The case was referred down to the Federal Court of Australia on a constitutional application to the High Court of Australia after Joe Bryant added an urgent application for an injunction restraining the AEC from refusing to count the votes and ordering them to widely publicise that their claims such votes are invalid were wrong. The Constitutional case disputed the validity of s240(2)and is unlikely to be treated as urgent. It needs to be extended to other issues such as the validity of s57, 240, 268 and 274 and of the whole scheme for establishing an unrepresentative Executive dominated legislature. There could also be some interesting questions about the source of the authority of the government of Australia in the absence of an act of self determination by the Australian people in connection with the independence of Australia subsequent to Federation and consequent cessation of British law, including the Constitution Act 1901 and the Letters Patent to the Governor-General. A No vote in connection with the republic referendum could be important legally as well as politically. A separate case is being planned by independent Senate candidates concerning the disadvantage to them resulting from their exclusion from the ticket voting system in s273(1) used by more than 95% of voters. (This has already been held valid by a single judge of the HCA in McKenzie v Commonwealth). It strikes me as a minor matter given that only 2 candidates (or 1 incumbent Senator) are required to form a group entitled to a ticket. More interesting would be a challenge to the provision for 2 or 3 tickets to be registered in ss273(2) and (3), and the votes split among them. That is simply ridiculous and reaches further heights of absurdity in s274(4) which provides that if for "any reason" (ie the HCA agreeing that it is ridiculous) the votes cannot be counted according to (2) or (3) they should be counted according to (5). (5) provides for ignoring those preferences after the initial preferences common to all 2 or 3 split tickets. Thus voters have guess how their votes might be counted. Another case still pending is my application for Leave to Appeal from the upholding of the injunction against me in 1996. We should be discussing how to make use of the legal challenges as part of building a political campaign. Petitions to the Court of Disputed Returns have to be filed within 40 days of the return of the writs (which is due by 9 December 1998). The above judgment is another classicial illustration of judicial misconduct and incompetence which would certainly result in dismissal from office if we actually had a representative legislature able to do so. Needless to say, its claims about my views on optional and compulsory preferential voting and s270 are completely wrong. (I support compulsory preferential voting and have consistently claimed that votes rejecting more than 1 candidate are formal independently of s270). Meanwhile, we can't expect the judicial lizards to declare that their colleagues the political lizards and bureaucrat lizards are criminals. So far all those considering any aspect of the question have been more inclined to join them in criminal interference with the political rights of the Australian people. Another avenue would be a communication to the International Human Rights Committee. This has no legal effect and requires first "exhausting all domestic remedies" but could severely embarass the Australian lizards in the eyes of their colleagues in other countries who have so far managed to maintain their power without officially directing people to vote in favor of lizards they want to vote against.
Joseph Richard Bryant v Commonwealth of Australia [1998] 1242 FCA (30 September 1998).url
