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https://www.aec.gov.au/faqs/misleading-and-deceptive-communications.htm
There is a criminal offence in s 329(1) of the Electoral Act:
A person shall not, during the relevant period in relation to an election under this Act, print, publish or distribute, or cause, permit or authorize to be printed, published or distributed, any matter or thing that is likely to mislead or deceive an elector in relation to the casting of a vote.
Surely we're crossing that line here?
Given that the Liberals put up posters in the AEC colours, in Chinese saying "The correct way to vote is to put 1 next to Liberals" one election
And had literally no repercussions, I'm guessing nothing will be done about this either. I imagine it will come down to a "But both sides did it so it's okay"
Despite us not being a two party system
fairly sure it’s also against the privacy act too
Didn't look closely at it, but i'm pretty sure we received a Nationals and then a Liberal one of these today. Might pull them out of the bin and have a closer look.
No Labor one though, just a flyer. Or should i say yet?
Sorry what actually is the scam?
ALP or LNP provide forms which look like a registration for a postal vote, then when they receive the completed form they store the voters details and then submit the actual application for a postal vote.
Is that it? Stealing voter details?
Harvesting personal information while impersonating official electoral comms.
While they technically have the right authorisations on them, the envelope and postal vote form I received could easily be mistaken as official from anyone not paying 100% attention.
According to the article the websites both take all your information then redirect you to the actual postal voting registration, potentially leading voters to think they've already submitted for a postal vote when they haven't.
I agree that it's a shit practice, but it just doesn't seem very dastardly or nefarious?
I can see that there's the potential for someone to think they've registered when they have not, but that's not the intention.