Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918

This section applies if the scrutiny of votes in a Senate election for a particular State or Territory is, or is to be, conducted in compliance with section 273A.

The Electoral Commissioner must arrange for statistically significant samples of ballot papers to be checked throughout the scrutiny of votes for the election to assure that the electronic data used in counting the votes reflects the data recorded on the ballot papers.

The Electoral Commissioner must ensure that:

if the election was held concurrently with a general election for the House of Representatives—at least 5,000 ballot papers in total are checked under subsection (2) throughout the scrutiny of votes for the election and for the other Senate elections that were held concurrently with that general election; or

if the election was held alone—at least 1,000 ballot papers are checked under subsection (2) throughout the scrutiny of votes for the election.

The ballot paper sampling process is not part of the scrutiny in relation to the election.

The ballot paper sampling process may be inspected by the scrutineers at the counting centre where the scrutiny is being conducted.

Before the polling day for the election, the Electoral Commissioner must publish on the Electoral Commission’s website:

the methodology to be used for the ballot paper sampling process; and

the process to be used for reconciling preferences.

Within 14 days after the return of the writ for the election, the Electoral Commissioner must publish on the Electoral Commission’s website a statement setting out the outcomes of the ballot paper sampling process.

In this section: