Long Title: An Act to make miscellaneous amendments to the Electoral Act 2017, the Electoral Funding Act 2018, the Independent Commission Against Corruption Act 1988 and the Local Government Act 1993.
Ms JENNY AITCHISON (Maitland—Minister for Regional Transport, and Minister for Roads) (16:23): I move:
That this bill be now read a second time.
The Electoral Legislation Amendment (Elections) Bill 2026 amends the Electoral Act 2017 and the Electoral Funding Act 2018, among other Acts, to facilitate the 2027 New South Wales general election and to implement recommendations made by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters—which I will refer to as the joint standing committee—and one recommendation made by the Independent Commission Against Corruption. In August last year the Minister for Local Government notified the House of the Government's intention to bring the 2027 general election date forward by two weeks to avoid a clash with the Easter holiday weekend, which falls over the weekend of Saturday 27 March 2027. The bill includes special provisions to facilitate the holding of the election on 13 March 2027, which is two weeks earlier than it is due to fall otherwise.
The bill implements recommendations made by the joint standing committee in its report entitled Proposals to increase voter engagement, participation and confidence. These amendments, as well as other changes to strengthen integrity and confidence in the electoral system, support the Government's ambitious targets of 100 per cent enrolment, 100 per cent turnout and 100 per cent formality rates—and 100 per cent confidence—for New South Wales elections. The bill implements 18 recommendations made by the joint standing committee in its report entitled Administration of the 2023 NSW State election and other matters. The bill also implements two recommendations of the joint standing committee's recently tabled report entitled Annual amount distributed to minor parties from the administration fund. Finally, the bill also implements other proposals from the NSW Electoral Commission and the Government to facilitate the 2027 general election and improve the administration and enforcement of the New South Wales electoral funding and donations framework.
Before I move to the details of the bill, I will speak to the change of date for the 2027 State general election. As members are aware, the Constitution Act 1902 and the Electoral Act 2017 provide for fixed four‑year terms, with general elections held on the fourth Saturday in March every four years. Polling day for the 2027 election is due to fall on Saturday 27 March, which is during the Easter public holiday weekend. This is the first time there has been a clash with the election date on the Easter weekend since fixed-term elections were introduced. Holding an election on the holiday weekend would cause logistical issues for New South Wales electors and present operational challenges for the Electoral Commissioner's conduct of the election. The Constitution Act provides that when the election is due to be held "during a holiday period or at any other inconvenient time", the Legislative Assembly may be dissolved up to two months early by proclamation of the Governor.
The Government intends to recommend to the Governor the making of a proclamation to dissolve the Legislative Assembly on 19 February 2027. This is two weeks earlier than the Assembly would otherwise be due to expire under the Constitution Act. This will enable the next State election to be held two weeks early, on 13 March 2027. The Minister for Local Government notified the House of the proposed change of date of the election on 7 August 2025, following consultation by the Government with the Electoral Commissioner, the Governor of New South Wales, the Opposition and members of the crossbench. This bill inserts critical special provisions in schedule 1 to facilitate the change of date. The special provisions clarify that the pre-election and capped expenditure periods will commence on 1 October 2026 and end on election day, which is consistent with the usual provisions that apply to a general election. The special provisions also provide that the nomination period will commence on 15 February 2027, to provide for the usual eight business days period for the lodging of nominations with the NSW Electoral Commission.
I move now to the details of the bill and the amendments to the Electoral Act 2017 in schedule 1. Enrolment, turnout and formality rates are key indicators of voter engagement with the democratic process and the overall health of the democratic system. New South Wales should be very proud of its high rates of electoral participation, especially when compared with international examples. However, the strength of electoral systems and democratic processes across the world are regularly being challenged. The following amendments in the bill will support electoral integrity, voter participation, access and confidence. The bill implements the joint standing committee's recommendation to allow the Electoral Commissioner to deploy mobile polling booths at State elections. The joint standing committee considered that mobile polling booths may help to reduce participation barriers for people in remote and regional areas, and particularly First Nations communities in those areas. Currently, the NSW Electoral Commission cannot provide mobile early voting services other than for declared facilities, which are limited to hospitals, nursing homes, retirement villages or similar facilities. The bill adds New South Wales correctional centres to that list to ensure in-person early voting services can be provided to inmates.
The bill also provides that electors with a physical disability, illness, advanced pregnancy or other condition may vote outside of but in close proximity to the voting centre in prescribed circumstances. This is consistent with existing Federal provisions. In recognition of the importance of voter education and information for increasing electoral participation, the bill makes the NSW Electoral Commission's existing education and public awareness function mandatory instead of discretionary. This is in line with equivalent mandatory functions of the Victorian Electoral Commission and the Australian Electoral Commission. Recognising the increasing use and prevalence of artificial intelligence, the bill regulates digitally generated electoral material during the period from the issue of the writs for an election until 6.00 p.m. on election day. While AI can have a significant positive impact in our society, when used maliciously it has the potential to mislead voters and undermine the legitimacy of our electoral processes.
The bill introduces a new offence to prohibit the printing, publishing or distribution of digitally generated electoral material unless it carries a statement to that effect. "Digitally generated electoral material" is defined in the bill as electoral material containing audiovisual, visual or audio content that is "generated substantially, or modified or altered significantly, by artificial intelligence". The definition expressly excludes a cartoon or animated drawing. The bill also introduces a new offence to prohibit the printing, publishing, distribution or public display of digitally generated electoral material where it depicts a simulated person performing an act that the real person depicted did not perform. It will be a defence if the written consent of the real person was obtained.
It will be a defence to both new offences if the defendant took no part in determining the content and could not reasonably be expected to have known that the content contravened the offence provision. The existing defences and exceptions in section 190 of the Electoral Act will also apply to these new offences, including that a person is not guilty of an offence if the breach was not material or not intended or not likely to mislead an elector in relation to the casting of their vote. The penalties are consistent with those for existing offences relating to electoral material during the regulated period set out in sections 183 to 184 and section 186 of the Electoral Act.
The purpose of these reforms is to safeguard New South Wales elections from the spread of misinformation by artificial intelligence, which may be used to manipulate public opinion or unfairly target specific groups of voters, potentially undermining the fairness and integrity of the entire election process. We have all seen examples where deepfakes of politicians or other public figures have been used to mislead the public into believing the depicted person said or did something that they did not. The definition of "digitally generated electoral material" also captures electoral material where, for example, a base image, video or audio is substantially or significantly altered using AI. It is not intended to capture electoral material that has been altered using AI in a minor way, such as by airbrushing or retouching photos, adding subtitles, making formatting or minor grammatical improvements, or changing the brightness or contrast of images using a software program.
These amendments support the integrity of New South Wales elections and manage the risk of false AI‑generated information negatively impacting confidence in New South Wales elections. Similar offences were recently inserted into the South Australian electoral framework. Currently, all electoral material distributed on election day in a public place must be registered with the Electoral Commissioner. The bill introduces a new offence to prohibit the distribution of electoral material in a public place on a day on which early voting is conducted unless the material is registered. The requirement will only apply where the material is distributed within 100 metres of a voting centre that is being used as an early voting centre.
Section 199 of the Electoral Act currently provides that an application may be made for the registration of electoral material only during the period starting with the nomination day and ending at 5.00 p.m. on the Friday that is eight days before election day. The bill permits an application to be made during the period commencing on the Monday before election day and ending at 5.00 p.m. on the Thursday before polling day for the registration of additional electoral material that may be used both on days on which early voting is conducted and on election day. During this period any such application must be determined by the Electoral Commissioner within 24 hours of receipt of the application.
As recommended by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters, the bill increases penalties for offences relating to non-complying electoral material, particularly material that aims to mislead voters. The maximum penalty for the offence of printing, publishing or distributing non-complying electoral material in section 183 of the Electoral Act will increase from 100 to 300 penalty units for a corporation. For individuals, the maximum penalty will increase from 20 penalty units or six months imprisonment to 60 penalty units or six months imprisonment. This aligns with Victorian penalties for similar offences. The same increased penalties will apply to the offence in section 184 of displaying posters containing non-compliant electoral material. Finally, the bill modernises authorisation requirements for electoral material by removing the requirement to display the name and address of the printer on printed electoral material.
The bill makes important changes to increase safety for our election officials, who are critical to the delivery of New South Wales elections, and to ensure secrecy of the ballot. During the 2023 New South Wales election the Electoral Commission became aware that some officials were being filmed or photographed by members of the public in the course of their duties without their consent. In some cases, the footage and images that identified election officials were then published on social media, accompanied by false statements or misleading commentary. Not only does this conduct cause distress for those officials; it may also affect the capacity of the Electoral Commission to recruit willing workers over time and diminish trust in New South Wales elections.
The bill introduces a new offence to prohibit photographing or recording inside a voting centre or ballot counting place without the permission of the voting centre manager or person in charge of the ballot counting place. The other new penalty offence prohibits a person outside a voting centre or ballot counting place from recording or photographing an election official or scrutineer if it is reasonably likely to cause the official or scrutineer to be intimidated or harassed. It is a further offence if a person publishes or distributes such a photograph, audio or recording. Those amendments reflect similar offences that already apply at New South Wales local government elections. These amendments send a clear signal that the safety of election officials is a serious matter, and they deter conduct that causes intimidation or harassment.
The bill makes a number of amendments to better protect the privacy of voter enrolment information. Currently, candidates in an election may request a list of electors from the Electoral Commission under section 49 of the Electoral Act. The bill implements the committee's recommendation to ensure that candidates can only make such a request within 48 hours before the close of voting. This is to ensure that this information is used only for election-related purposes. Where persons other than parties, members and candidates apply for enrolment information under section 50 of the Electoral Act, the bill provides that the Electoral Commissioner may not make a finding that could result in the release of voters' personal information on the electoral roll unless the Electoral Commissioner has first consulted with the NSW Privacy Commissioner and identified a public interest in providing the requested information that outweighs the public interest in protecting the privacy of personal information in the circumstances.
This amendment is in response to the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters' recommendation 19 in its report on voter engagement, participation and confidence, and it follows consultation with the Information and Privacy Commission. The bill increases safeguards in relation to the provision of electoral information that the Electoral Commissioner is required to provide to registered parties and elected members following an election under section 222 of the Electoral Act by enabling the commissioner to require an undertaking that the party or member's systems and procedures will be adequate to preserve the security of the information. The bill also increases protections for silent electors by expressly prohibiting the publication of a silent elector's address in the register of parties, and it makes changes to protect the residential addresses of elected members and registered candidates from public disclosure.
Finally, schedule 3 to the bill amends the Independent Commission Against Corruption Act 1988 to require the Electoral Commissioner to provide the Chief Commissioner of the ICAC certain electoral roll information but only for a prescribed purpose and only if certain written assurances relating to the storage, use and disposal of that information are provided by the chief commissioner. The chief commissioner has advised that the information on the electoral roll is of critical operational importance to the ICAC and is required for it to carry out its functions. The bill regulates the distribution and collection of postal vote applications. During the joint standing committee's inquiry into the 2023 State election, concerns were raised about parties and candidates distributing and collecting postal vote applications, and about the collection of voters' personal information by parties and candidates. Concerns were also raised about postal vote application forms distributed by parties and candidates being confused with official communications from the Electoral Commission.
The bill introduces amendments to address these risks by introducing new provisions to regulate the distribution and collection of postal vote applications. The bill provides that a person, other than the Electoral Commissioner, may only distribute an application to vote by post if it is in the form approved by the Electoral Commission, the form states that it must be submitted directly to the Electoral Commissioner, and no additional information or matter appears on the application. The bill also provides that it is an offence with a maximum penalty of 20 penalty units to solicit another person to return or submit their postal vote application to anyone other than the Electoral Commissioner. It is a further offence for a person other than the Electoral Commissioner to collect personal information about a voter in connection with the distribution or collection of an application to vote by post without their written consent.
This change will prevent the practice of parties and candidates embedding the Electoral Commissioner's postal vote application form in their own documents, which can then lead to confusion about which forms have been authorised and distributed by the commission. It will also prevent parties and candidates from soliciting postal vote application forms to be returned to a party, rather than directly to the Electoral Commissioner. However, the amendment would not prevent, for example, a member of Parliament providing general information to a constituent as to how to apply to vote by post.
The bill will require senior office holders of registered parties to now be enrolled in New South Wales. While party agents must be enrolled to vote in New South Wales State elections, other senior office holders of a registered party are not currently required to be enrolled or reside in New South Wales. The bill amends the Electoral Act to require that the registered officer, deputy registered officer and secretary of a registered party be enrolled to vote in New South Wales. As recognised by the joint standing committee, this change will assist the Electoral Commission in exercising its enforcement powers and ensure that these officials are New South Wales voters. Transitional provisions provide registered parties with six months to apply to update the register of parties, if required, to ensure that their registered officer, deputy or secretary's enrolment address is in New South Wales.
The bill also amends the Electoral Funding Act to provide that a registered party is not eligible for payments under two parts of the Act—part 4, which relates to public funding of election campaigns, and part 5, which relates to administrative and new party funding, unless the party's senior office holders are enrolled in New South Wales. Registered parties are required to provide the Electoral Commission with a list of the names and enrolled addresses of those senior office holders, and a summary of their roles and responsibilities, under section 98 of the Electoral Funding Act. A transitional provision provides that this amendment commences six months from the date of assent of the amending Act, which will allow time for parties to update their list of senior office holders and their enrolled addresses and summaries of the responsibilities with the Electoral Commission.
To support informed voting and reduce the possibility of confusing information on ballot papers and other election materials, the bill will strengthen restrictions on party names and logos that can be registered. The bill implements a joint standing committee recommendation that parties cannot use the word "Independent" in their registered names, abbreviations or logos. Parties will also be prohibited from registering their name, abbreviation, or logo if it consists only of an individual's name. No parties currently registered for State elections will be affected by this change. However, some parties registered only for local government elections will be affected. A transitional provision provides six months for any registered parties to apply to vary their party name, abbreviation or logo so that they are compliant.
The bill implements the joint standing committee's recommendations to better facilitate overseas voting and to simplify and adopt similar provisions for interstate voting. The bill requires the Electoral Commissioner to publish the location and operations of voting centres, including early voting centres and interstate and overseas voting centres, on the Electoral Commission's website as soon as practicable after those locations are appointed. This is consistent with recommendation 6 of the joint standing committee's 2023 election report, which recommended that these locations are published well before the 2027 State election, where possible. The bill gives the Electoral Commissioner the power to appoint a place interstate or outside Australia as an early voting centre for all electoral districts if the commissioner is satisfied it would enhance the convenience of a large number of electors.
The amendments will also improve overseas postal voting. The joint standing committee found that during the 2023 general election, international postal delays frequently prevented overseas postal votes from reaching the Electoral Commission in time to be counted. The amendments enable postal votes to be received by an election official overseas by a prescribed date and time, which will be published on the Electoral Commission's website. The votes will then be couriered by the overseas election official to the Electoral Commission. This will ensure that the commission receives overseas postal votes on time to be included in the count. As recommended by the joint standing committee, the bill enables more flexibility around who may be appointed as an overseas or interstate election official. The amendments are consistent with the special provisions that were in place for the 2023 election, which permitted the appointment of overseas election officials who the Electoral Commissioner considers has the appropriate skills and experience.
The bill extends the prohibition on the use of technology-assisted voting, other than telephone voting for blind and low-vision voters, at the 2027 State general election and at by-elections up until the 2031 State general election. The NSW Electoral Commission has advised that it will not be possible to provide internet voting before the 2031 State general election. The Government is committed to supporting all citizens, including blind and low‑vision voters, to cast their votes. The amendment in the bill will permit telephone voting by electors who are blind or who have low vision, which was also in place for the 2023 New South Wales election. The Government will continue to engage with blind and vision-impaired communities in developing technology-assisted voting solutions.
The bill will implement recommendation 7 of the ICAC's Operation Aero report that the Government amend the Electoral Funding Act to give the Electoral Commission power to publish the results of its compliance audits, investigations and regulatory actions. Section 268 of the Electoral Act was amended prior to the Operation Aero report, including to allow the Electoral Commission and Electoral Commissioner to publicly report on the progress or outcome of an investigation into possible contraventions of the Electoral Act or Electoral Funding Act, if satisfied that doing so is in the public interest.
The bill will enable the Electoral Commission and commissioner to also publicly report on the outcome of any regulatory action or compliance audit, in addition to where they are satisfied that the disclosure is in the public interest. The bill will also allow public reporting on the progress or outcomes of current or future investigations, regulatory action and compliance audits under predecessor legislation. The amendment will expressly not apply to an investigation, regulatory action or compliance audit that, in the opinion of the Electoral Commissioner or Electoral Commission, was completed before the commencement of the amending Act.
I now turn to the amendments to the Electoral Funding Act, detailed in schedule 2 to the bill. The bill will require the disclosure of reportable political donations within seven days—instead of within 21 days—of being received or made during the pre-election period. The pre-election period will commence on 1 October 2026. That will align New South Wales' disclosure requirements more closely with other Australian jurisdictions and will support increased transparency so that voters know who has contributed to a candidate or party's election campaign before casting their vote.
The bill requires parties to disclose whether reportable political donations made to it were solicited by or made for the purpose of benefiting a particular candidate endorsed by the party and, if so, the name of that candidate or candidates. That will enable the public to better scrutinise the links between donations and decisions. The amendment implements recommendation 26 of the Expert Panel on Political Donations in its 2014 report and recommendation 1 of the joint standing committee in its 2016 report on its examination of the expert panel's final report. The amendment is supported by a new regulation-making power, which enables regulations to be made for the purpose of determining whether a political donation was solicited by or made for the purpose of benefiting a particular candidate. The amendment will commence on 1 July 2026.
On 26 February 2026 the joint standing committee published a report on its inquiry entitled Annual amount distributed to minor parties from the administration fund. The bill implements two recommendations made by the committee in that recent report. As members will be aware, the Administration Fund is a statutory public funding scheme administered by the Electoral Commission. It reimburses eligible parties and Independent members of the New South Wales Parliament for administrative and operating expenditure incurred on a quarterly basis. The fund's purpose is to support the ongoing administrative functioning of parties and Independent members between elections, rather than election-specific campaigning activity. The maximum quarterly amounts available to eligible parties from the Administration Fund is dependent on the number of elected members of Parliament in the party. Independent members are also eligible for funding under section 88 (2) of the Electoral Funding Act.
The joint standing committee found that the current level of funding provided is inadequate to cover the actual costs incurred for administration and compliance requirements, and those costs are rising. That accounts for a high proportion of party spending, and the costs are disproportionately high for minor parties and Independents as compliance obligations are the same for all parties regardless of their size and funding. It is also recommended that compliance obligations will increase in response to recommendations of the working group that the Government is establishing to respond to the recommendations of the ICAC's Operation Aero. As recommended by the joint standing committee in recommendation 1 of its report, the bill will increase the quarterly maximum amounts available to be distributed to eligible parties from the Administration Fund under section 87 (3) (a) to (d) of the Electoral Funding Act.
The bill will also increase the quarterly maximum amounts available to Independent members to align with the same proportional increase for parties with only one elected member endorsed by the party. In its 2026 report, the joint standing committee noted that Independent members who also receive payments from the Administration Fund would be facing similar challenges to those faced by minor parties. Although it did not recommend an increase for Independent members as that was outside the referred terms of reference, it recommended that it be something the Government consider. The proposed changes relating to Administration Fund entitlements will commence on proclamation after implementation of any recommendations of the working group that is being established to consider Operation Aero recommendations to improve governance standards for political parties. The amended amounts will continue to be adjusted annually for inflation each calendar year as provided for in clause 5 of schedule 1.
The bill also implements recommendation 4 of the recent joint standing committee report to provide that actual administrative expenditure incurred in excess of the maximum quarterly amount can be carried over a longer period than a calendar year. Currently under the Electoral Funding Act if actual administrative expenditure incurred by a party or member in a quarter exceeds the amount they are eligible to claim for that quarter, the excess can be carried over to a subsequent quarter in the same calendar year. The joint standing committee recognised that can cause difficulties for parties that incur large administrative expenses late in a calendar year. To solve that problem, the bill amends section 90 (1) of the Act to allow for claims for actual administrative expenditure to be carried over to subsequent quarters beyond the calendar year.
I move now to changes to the Election Campaigns Fund entitlements. As members are aware, the Election Campaigns Fund is a statutory public funding scheme administered by the Electoral Commission that reimburses eligible parties and candidates for electoral expenditure incurred in connection with a State general election or a State by-election. The fund's purpose is to offset the costs of conducting election campaigns, subject to strict eligibility criteria and expenditure caps. Following an election, the payments made to eligible parties are the lesser of the total amount of actual campaign expenditure of the party and endorsed candidates, or an amount calculated in accordance with a dollar-per-vote formula for each first-preference vote received by the endorsed candidate.
The bill makes changes to that dollar-per-vote formula to decrease entitlements for one category of parties. The parties who will be affected by the change are those who meet the eligibility criteria in section 66 (3) of the Electoral Funding Act for the Legislative Council but do not meet the eligibility criteria in respect of the Legislative Assembly and who have between 10 and 24 candidates in the Legislative Assembly. To break that down further, this will only impact parties where their endorsed candidates in the Legislative Council, and all other candidates in the same group, receive at least 4 per cent of the first-preference votes in the election but their endorsed candidates in the Legislative Assembly do not receive at least 4 per cent of the total first-preference votes in the districts for which candidates were nominated and the party has between 10 and 24 candidates in the Legislative Assembly.
For those parties, the change will decrease the dollar-per-vote entitlement for parties in the Legislative Assembly from $5.30 to $3.98 per first-preference vote received by the endorsed candidates of the party in the Legislative Assembly. They will continue to also be entitled to $3.98 per first-preference vote received by the endorsed candidates in the Legislative Council. All other categories of eligible parties will remain unaffected. Those changes are intended to recalibrate public funding levels for election campaigning ahead of the 2027 State general election. Importantly, the bill does not change the way in which eligible parties are reimbursed. That will ensure that existing integrity safeguards remain in place. Finally, the bill also makes other minor miscellaneous amendments, including consequential amendments, to give effect to the objects of the bill. Schedule 4 to the bill makes minor consequential amendments to the Local Government Act 1993.
The bill has been subject to extensive consultation, including with the Opposition and members of the crossbench. I thank members for their feedback during consultation, which has shaped the bill. I thank the Electoral Commissioner and staff at the NSW Electoral Commission for their valuable contributions to the development of the bill and for providing technical advice and sharing their experience in the development of these reforms. The bill represents a significant step in strengthening the integrity and transparency of our electoral system. It is the result of careful consideration of the 2023 State election, detailed inquiries led by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters and the advice of Electoral Commission staff in relation to the practicalities of administering elections in our State. I am confident that the Electoral Legislation Amendment (Elections) Bill 2026 will ensure that our electoral framework is robust and capable of ensuring high levels of voter confidence and participation in the lead-up to the State election next year. I commend the bill to the House.
