High Court kills Howard's election law

Up to 100,000 more Australians could be allowed to vote in the August 21 election after the High Court today ruled that parts of the Electoral Act are unconstitutional.

The advocacy group GetUp! believes tens of thousands of people may have been excluded from the electoral rolls because they missed registration deadlines introduced by the Howard government in 2006.

GetUp!'s national director Simon Sheikh called the decision "historic" and said it could make a difference in some marginal seats in the coming poll.

This campaign has been a long fight. It began back in 2006, when the former Howard Government passed laws that closed the electoral roll at 8pm the same day an election is officially called. The laws were called the 'Electoral Integrity Act' - but in effect they prevented hundreds of thousands of Australians from voting; particularly young people, recent migrants, Indigenous Australians and poorer Australians. 

He said that never before in Australia’s history had a case of this magnitude been won in a two-week period.

The decision affects 100,000 people who enrolled after one day and within one week of writs being issued.

GetUp! would not push for the AEC to reopen the electoral roll, Mr Sheikh said.

About 20 lawyers, led by Ron Merkel, QC, worked around the clock on a pro-bono basis.

The High Court has ordered their costs be covered by the Commonwealth.

Success was not a given, but it now had the potential to make a significant impact come polling day, Mr Sheikh said.

"Clearly 100,000 Australians who can now exercise their right to vote is an extraordinarily large number," Mr Sheikh said.

"With marginal seats across the country and an extremely tight election, [this] could have a massive impact on the election."

ABC election analyst Antony Green says the decision is likely to favour Labor and the Greens.

"Given all the publicity, I would imagine there would be a huge increase in the number of 18-year-olds on the roll and that would probably assist Labor and Greens," he said.

In fact it would be most surprising that any new enrolments would not vote against the politicians who tried so desperately to deny them a vote. The Coalition used their numbers in the Senate to prevent the Labor government from restoring these rights to up to one and half million people who are to this day are not registered to vote.