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Australian Electoral Commission
File reference: Reg5153, 13/399
The delegate of the Australian Electoral Commission determined that the application to register the Liberal Movement under the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 should be refused.
On 1 July 2013, a delegate of the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) refused an application from the Liberal Movement (the Party) for registration as a political party under the provisions of Part XI of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (the Electoral Act).
The AEC received an application from the Party on 13 May 2013. On 14 June 2013, the AEC issued a notice under s.131 of the Electoral Act advising the Party that after initial testing it could not find at least 500 members of the Party that were on the electoral roll, as required under section 123(1)(a)(ii) of the Electoral Act.
On 25 June 2013, the Party responded to the notice with a revised membership list.
Section 123 of the Electoral Act requires a non-Parliamentary party to have at least 500 members on the electoral roll before the party is eligible for registration.
To ascertain whether the submitted members are on the electoral roll the membership list is first run against a database of the roll for automatic matching before manual matches are conducted by AEC staff to account for typographical and data errors such as misspelt names or incorrectly entered dates of birth.
The AEC test of the revised membership list indicated that 470 members could be automatically matched to the electoral roll. A further 25 members of the Party were matched during the manual matching process. This meant that the Party only had 495 members which could be identified on the electoral roll which is short of the requirement of 500 members set out in the Electoral Act.
The AEC checked members on the revised membership list lodged by the Party against the electoral roll both automatically and manually, but could not identify 500 members that were on the electoral roll.
The AEC could not be satisfied that the Party was eligible for registration as a political party under s.123 of the Electoral Act.
The delegate of the AEC refused the application for registration from the Liberal Movement.
The AEC acknowledges the Traditional Owners of country throughout Australia and recognises their continuing connection to land, waters, culture and community. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging.