Pre-poll attracts record numbers as voters wait in car parks

Gold Coast voters continued to arrive in large numbers at polling booths today, but maintained their social distancing following warnings about coronavirus.

Gold Coast voters continued to arrive in large numbers at polling booths today, but maintained their social distancing following warnings about coronavirus.

At the Helensvale Community Centre this morning, residents were lined up in the car park before pre-poll started at 9am, most of them keeping at least two metres apart.

Outside pre-polling at the Helensvale Community Centre.

Candidates and councillors are continuing to get contact from isolated elderly residents seeking to either postal vote or use telephone voting. They are staying away from booths other than to put their signage up at dawn.

Helensvale-based councillor William Owen-Jones in a Facebook update to residents explained it was the State Government which controlled the staging of the poll.

“Local governments do not have the power to stop the election, postpone, or change the way we vote. As of right now the elections are continuing,” he said.

The options were pre-poll, postal votes, and phone voting for the elderly or sick.

The total number of early voters is more than 500,000 which exceeds the full early voting period in the 2016 poll.

Pre-polling at the Helensvale Community Centre.

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About 8,600 people have registered for telephone voting with just more than half of those eligible voting that way. The contact number is 1300912782.

Some residents have complained to councillors that they were yet to receive their postal votes despite applying a week before the deadline.

Former councillor and Division 10 candidate Eddy Sarroff today demanded the Electoral Commission of Queensland change the timelines for the poll to accommodate an extension for postal voting.

“Nobody cares when the election ends, they care about their health and the health of their families, is that so difficult to understand Premier,” he said.

“My constituents have been telling me they tried to contact the ECQ to arrange a postal vote only to find they could not contact the ECQ by phone and they have missed the deadline to obtain a postal vote.

Cr William Owen-Jones — informing residents of their voting options. Picture: Jerad Williams.

“Our democracy will not be served by continuing the elections and denying hundreds of thousands of Queenslanders the opportunity to vote in safety — people are already making the decision not to vote.

“We are seeing closures of businesses and other drastic decisions, however for some reason the ECQ are being pig-headed and not listening to the people. I know my people, I know how they are feeling and what they want and they don’t want to go to a polling booth on Saturday.”

Mr Sarroff also said the ECQ should extend the phone voting which currently is only available to those who were in self isolation and allow elderly people to exercise their democratic right and cast a vote.