Garth Hamilton calls for safer federal election pre-poll arrangements

Interim inquiry report recommends AEC review to ensure adequate arrangements

A Liberal-National MP has called for a rethink of pre-poll voting at federal elections, including potentially shortening the amount of time booths are open, amid concerns of threats to voters and volunteers. Garth Hamilton, the member for the Queensland electorate of Groom and a Toowoomba-based politician, made the appeal as security risks to politicians and their staff stayed front and centre this week, with parliament returning after the alleged attack on Helen Haines. The independent MP remained in a serious but stable condition after both her legs were amputated.

Hamilton said the risk of members of the public and volunteers lining up at booths near car parks or roads needed to be assessed. On Tuesday, he said: “I’ve had three elections and I’ve witnessed three interactions between cars and people at pre-poll, two accidental, one wasn’t.” Hamilton added: “The threat is already there, the potential is already there in a heightened environment.”

Pre-polling booths usually open one to two weeks before an election. Hamilton said the length of the pre-polling period, the allocation of resources at centres and the role of postal voting were all measures that could be considered to lower the risk to voters and staff. “What we obviously want is not in any way to restrict anybody’s access to democracy, but we also want to make sure that it’s done in a safe way,” Hamilton said. He added: “There’s a reasonable conversation to be had on the shape of pre-poll in Australia, if these threats are increasing, and that’s what we’re hearing from the AFP.”

The Australian Electoral Commission put the operational case against shortening the period. Australians are increasingly choosing to vote early ahead of polling day, and the AEC’s 2025 election report said more than 9 million votes, or 56%, were cast at early-voting centres. Advising the parliamentary inquiry into the 2025 election, the AEC said shortening the pre-poll period would not decrease early voting but would instead “compress the growing demand into a shorter period and increase operational risks, such as queues and shortages of appropriate venues.”

It is understood that Jerome Laxale, a Labor MP who chairs the parliamentary inquiry into the 2025 election, raised safety and his committee’s interim report on the issue at a caucus meeting on Tuesday. The interim report recommends that the electoral commission review the resourcing requirements and duration of pre-poll voting to ensure adequate arrangements are in place, noting the rising number of people opting to cast their ballot early.

Laxale, who has represented the NSW seat of Bennelong since 2022, said it was incumbent on the parliament to provide a safe and welcoming atmosphere at a polling booth. “Democracy doesn’t collapse, it just crumbles,” he said. “If people go, ‘you know what? I don’t want to deal with that. I’m not going to vote,’ then that has a snowball effect, which will undermine and erode our democratic process. Voting has to be safe and secure.”

Submissions to the inquiry detailed neo-Nazis turning up at booths with speakers, volunteers being bullied and harassed, and voters leaving polling centres in tears.

Independent MP Monique Ryan said candidates, volunteers and campaign workers facing threats of violence should be given clear guidance on how they might engage with federal and state police. “We need to go back to democracy sausages and bake sales, not voters feeling intimidated and harassed as they approach polling booths,” Ryan said.