"you are forced to vote other wise face a fine"

There is absolutely NO law in Australia that forces YOU to vote, otherwise you face a fine. The political system makes you BELIEVE that you must vote. It is a lie that the pollies want you to believe!

In Australia the law forces you to have your name marked off the voting list on voting day to say that you attended the polling booth. International laws (and laws here in the penal colonies) say that you vote anonymously, that is why your name does not appear on the ballot papers and is not tracable back to you once you place your vote.

On voting day all I ever do is to front the election assistant, state my name, I witness that they have correctly ruled off my name and address, I accept the ballot papers. I then proceed directly to the ballot box, as I appoach I tear up the ballot papers into as many little pieces as I possibly can and make as much noise as I can, and toss them onto the floor near the ballot box. Often people clap and acknowledge me when I do this.

I have never been fined or questioned by doing this. No one has any power to stop me from doing this.

That's what I mean you are forced to go to a polling booth and sign your name off if you have registered your name on the voting roll form if you just write some crap on the voting form the vote will automatically go to the party in power just remember this people not many are aware of this rule ....

Hello Loomer,

Agreed - if the ballot paper is placed into the ballot box.

However if the ballot paper is destroyed and is not placed into the ballot box, the vote cannot be counted anywhere. The vote simply is not counted.

this is true, but you as an individual citizen has still given up half an hour of your precious time on a Saturday morning to show up just to avoid a fine to achieve nothing. time would have been more productively spent if you stayed home and washed the freakken car!
im from ireland albeit 23 years ago and historically, people died in the struggle to be allowed to vote. its very ironic that nowadays you get fined if you dont vote!

Have a cold shower and think about. If people did not take the trouble to vote what do you think we would end up with? This is a serious issue. Neither the Liberals or the Labor parties have covered themselves in glory. Ask yourself why that it. It is because most Australians are generally complacent. They generally support one of the major parties but don't monitor their performance. The Greens are next to useless; their focus is as narrow as a pencil light. All politicians have their snouts in the trough. You don't hear the minor party members of Parliament saying "I'm not going to accept the payrise". Rarely, if ever, has a Parliamentarian's payrise been voted down, only delayed. The only way people will get the message out there is through their electorate office. If you feel so strongly about the issue, do something about it.

Voting still doesn't work if a politician has a personal grudge against something, just look at what's been happening with the R18+ rating for video games. Poll's have shown that 90% of people are for having that rating and yet it still gets rejected, what's the point of living in a democratic society if the majority of people vote for one thing and still doesn't get passed.

The only reason why I even voted at the last vote was to vote against Micheal Atkinson as much as I could.

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loomer Posted - 02/07/2010 : 19:47:30
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That's what I mean you are forced to go to a polling booth and sign your name off if you have registered your name on the voting roll form if you just write some crap on the voting form the vote will automatically go to the party in power just remember this people not many are aware of this rule ....

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Not quite sure who told you that. If you are at all interested in the actual process, have a read of[url='http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/backgrounders/files/2010-eb-informal-voting.pdf']this.[/url]

quote:

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16. A House of Representatives ballot paper is informal
if:
¡¡ the ballot paper has no vote indicated on it; or
¡¡ the ballot paper does not indicate the voterfs
first preference for 1 candidate and an order of
preference for all the remaining candidates.

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quote:

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30. It is not an offence to vote informally in a federal
election, nor is it an offence to encourage other
voters to vote informally. However, anyone who
encourages electors to vote informally, or to vote
e1,2,3,3,3...f etc on a House of Representatives
ballot paper, will be encouraging electors to waste
their votes as no vote will be counted from these
ballot papers.

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Jezuz Im all for a good government .... and as for the non vote I was told that by a good friend whom is a government lawyer ....!
At the end of the day we are still getting ripped off let do something bout it ...!

"At the end of the day we are still getting ripped off let do something bout it ...!"

I am open to discuss ideas. What would you recommend?

Simple fix really...anyone with the answers should go and run for government to fix the problems...thats the only way it will happen...[;^)]