The Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young and independent MP Monique Ryan have accused the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, of seeking to “undermine” faith in Australia’s electoral system by questioning longstanding rules about ballot papers in a debate about the Indigenous voice to parliament referendum.
Several members of the crossbench have accused the Coalition of a “new low” in the referendum debate, after the opposition leader and several of his MPs raised doubts about how ballots would be counted or excluded.
“To have a federal opposition leader try to undermine the legitimacy of our electoral system is a new low, even for him,” Hanson-Young said.
Hanson-Young also alleged that “seeking to cast doubt on the legitimacy of a referendum or election result like this” was similar to Donald Trump’s “playbook”.
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, is to officially announce the referendum date – widely expected to be 14 October – at a yes campaign event in Adelaide on Wednesday. The opposition continued its concerns on Monday about the Australian Electoral Commission’s policy which has been in place for 30 years and two previous referendums that ticks would be counted for yes votes but crosses would not count for no votes.
That rule, which was not changed by the Coalition during its previous nine-year term in government nor raised during recent debate about modernising referendum legislation, is regarded as a “savings provision” to ensure voters who incorrectly mark the ballot will still have their vote counted if their intention is clear. The referendum ballot paper, and the AEC, clearly ask people to write “yes” or “no” on their vote.
Dutton last week raised concerns about an “effective gerrymander” and said: “Just make it a fair process instead of trying to load the system and trying to skew it in favour of the ‘yes’ vote.”
On 2GB, the opposition leader called the rule “outrageous” and claimed Albanese had attempted to “have a process that’s rigged”.
Numerous Coalition politicians continued such criticisms over the weekend. The Nationals leader, David Littleproud, said on Monday that Australia had “moved past the legal advice [the AEC] got in the 1980s”.
Numerous crossbenchers supporting the yes campaign pushed back on Monday against the Coalition’s claims.
“It looks like Peter Dutton will do anything, even undermine faith in our democratic processes, to score cheap political points,” Monique Ryan, the independent MP who won Kooyong from Liberal incumbent Josh Frydenberg in 2022, said.
“At every turn, Peter Dutton’s Liberal party has used the voice for political gain. It’s cynical politics like this that lost the party government last year. It won’t help them win it back.”
Dutton’s office was approached for comment. In a statement, shadow attorney-general Michaelia Cash, maintained that the ticks and crosses issue “gives the yes case an unfair advantage”, calling for both to be treated equally.
“The decision to treat ticks as ‘yes’ but crosses as ambiguous is a decision the AEC has made. Saying that there’s a savings provision is misleading. There is no savings provision that deals with ticks and crosses,” she said.
“It’s not good enough to risk discounting people’s votes because of confidential legal advice from the 1980s. That advice must be released. It should not be kept from the Australian people.”
Hanson-Young, the senator from South Australia, added: “The Australian electoral system and the AEC are two of the most respected democratic institutions in the world.”
Fellow Greens senator Larissa Waters, the party’s spokesperson for democracy, lashed Dutton and the Coalition for “irresponsible behaviour” and “inaccurate culture war attacks on our democracy”.
“We have one of the strongest electoral systems in the world. Yet the AEC reported a significant increase in claims about voter fraud during the last election, mostly imported arguments from the US,” she said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“The response to the established, public & known legislative requirements for ballot papers is just another example of this type of online disinformation.”
The independent senator David Pocock, in his own post on X, called it “a new low from Peter Dutton and the no campaign”.
“Undermining trust in the [AEC] and framing 30 years of precedent as ‘rigged’ is incredibly concerning,” he wrote.
Speaking at a yes campaign event in Perth, the former Liberal MP and foreign affairs minister Julie Bishop strongly backed the voice in her role as Australian National University chancellor.
When asked what a no vote would mean for Australia’s international reputation, Bishop said she would be “most concerned at the message” it would send the world.
“I have no doubt that it would be sending a very negative message about the openness, and the empathy, and the respect and responsibility that the Australian people have for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.”
