Votes depend on trusty ute

After 1370 votes were lost, forcing WA to hold a fresh Senate election, former police chief Mick Keelty was appointed to review the Australian Electoral Commission’s processes. He indicated that there was some room for improvement: “It’s very Australian to have a ute pull up in a place in the middle of the night and throw boxes (of ballot papers) from one ute to another ute. I don’t want to absolutely break this process. It works. It works well. It works on trust, but it’s a century-old system and it needs to be lifted into 2014.”