Compulsory Voting in Australia
The electoral roll is a list of all people who are registered to vote in Australian elections. In Australia, all citizens over the age of 18 must enrol to vote. It is compulsory by law to enrol and compulsory by law to attend a polling place at election time.
Seventeen year olds may provisionally enrol and will be able to vote if their 18th birthday falls on or before polling day.
- Enrolment and voting in federal elections was voluntary from 1901.
- Permanent electoral rolls were established in 1908.
- Enrolment became compulsory in 1911.
Queensland was the first State to introduce compulsory voting in 1915.
Compulsory voting for Federal elections was introduced in 1924 and first used in the 1925 elections where 91.31% of the electorate cast a vote.
Enrolment and voting for Aboriginal people became compulsory in 1984.
Other countries which have some form of compulsory voting are:
- Argentina
- Austria
- Belgium
- Bolivia
- Brazil
- Cyprus
- Dominican Republic
- Egypt
- Greece
- Guatemala
- Honduras
- Liechenstein
- Luxembourg
- Panama
- Philippines
- Singapore
- Switzerland (some cantons only)
- Uruguay
- Venezuela
The only non-Australian citizens eligible to vote at federal elections in Australia are:
- British subjects who were on a Commonwealth electoral roll before 26 January 1984, at which time the eligibility requirements were altered.
The following people are not entitled to enrol and vote:
- prisoners serving a sentence of five years or more
- people who have been convicted of treason and not pardoned
- people who are incapable of understanding the nature and significance of enrolment and voting
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