AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY

AMENDMENTS OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY (ELECTION) REGULATIONS

EXPLANATORY STATEMENT

No. 9 of 1979

	The amendments of the Legislative Assembly (Election) Regulations have been made to reflect the change in title of the A.C.T. Legislative Assembly to the A.C.T. House of Assembly effected by the House of Assembly Ordinance 1979 and to make a number of changes to the procedures for the conduct of elections for the House of Assembly.

	The citation of the Regulations has been changed to House of Assembly (Election) Regulations and all references to the Legislative Assembly and to the Legislative Assembly Ordinance 1936 in the Regulations and the Schedule to the Regulations have been altered to reflect the change in title.

	Other amendments of the Regulations are intended to bring procedures at Assembly elections generally into line with those applying to other elections in the Territory and to correct some anomalies in the Regulations.  Briefly, these amendments
•	alter some definitions and the modifications of the Commonwealth Electoral Act in its application to Assembly elections
•	allow the appointment of Assistant Returning Officers in the same terms as in the Australian Capital Territory Representation Regulation
•	provide for 6 persons to sign candidates’ nomination forms and for the return of candidates’ deposits on the same conditions as apply to elections for the Senate
•	allow for the appointment of doorkeepers
•	alter references from ‘certified copy of the Roll’ to ‘certified list of voters’
•	allow applications for postal vote certificates and postal ballot-papers to be made to the Returning Officer for either Division in the Territory and for the completed certificates and ballot papers to be returned to either Returning Officer
•	change provisions governing the polling and the scrutiny at Assembly elections so they reflect, as far as practicable, equivalent provisions in the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918.