Newsroom

November 12, 2021

KENNEDY MP, Bob Katter, says the Federal LNP Government’s proposed voter ID laws are blatantly racist and will have the effect of disenfranchising First Australians.

Under the changes the LNP Government wants introduced, voters would have to produce an acceptable form of ID at polling places during federal elections.[1]

“This is blatantly racist and will prevent Frist Australians living in the community areas from voting,” Mr Katter said.

“To get a government issued ID in Queensland costs $73. If you’re on a pension with three kids, $73 is a lot of money. It’ll be $150 if you’re a husband and wife. And the Main Roads Departments that issue them are a long way away from parts of Cape York and the Torres Straits.

“You say there’s no racial laws in Australia? Well, the Queensland Government last year locked up the blackfellas in the community areas, whereas the rest of society was free to move around.

“There was rioting at Aurukun and demonstrations at Yarrabah over the lock up. They knew they were being locked up. A whitefella delivery driver could drive in and drive out of Yarrabah, but a blackfella delivery driver couldn’t drive out or come back in.

“You say there’s no racial laws? Well, the whitefellas can drink alcohol, the black fellas can’t drink alcohol in the community areas.

“I’m not a conspiracy theorist. Never have been, never will be. But I sure wish I hadn’t read 1984 and a Brave New World - the two famous books that are still on the reading list at the schools. This whole thing is scaring the hell out of me. There are CCTV cameras everywhere, police can pull you up when they feel like it, and now we’ve all got to carry identification cards to vote.

“If our freedoms are not already being taken off us, then the scene is set for a regime of inquisition.”

Mr Katter agreed that there were voting anomalies in Cape York and the Torres Straits, but he said the solution was the proper manning of voting booths by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) and Electoral Commission Qld (ECQ).

“The AEC and ECQ need to do proper investigations when incidents of voting fraud or anomalies are raised, and they must properly man the voting booths in the Torres Straits and Cape York with objective, at a distance, outsiders,” Mr Katter said.

“They’ve consistently said there are no anomalies, when it is generally well known that members of the Teachers Union man all of the booths as the official scrutineers. I’m not having a go at the teachers; we win most of the teachers’ votes in Kennedy. But in the Torres Straits and Cape York things are played to a different set of rules.

“There is extreme unhappiness at the votes in Cape York going 90% to the Labor Party. Nowhere in Australia does the ALP poll 90%. You have a super marginal federal seat in Leichhardt, and there is no doubt that these new laws will guarantee the election of the existing federal member. There is no doubt in my mind that if these laws were introduced at a state level, it would have ensured that we (Katter’s Australian Party) would have won the state seat of Cook at the last election.

“We’ve asked the Electoral Commissions to investigate the booth rigging throughout Cape York, and part of the Torres Straits, but to no avail.”