Senator David Pocock will ask the Australian Electoral Commission to review its controversial decision to backtrack on a ruling against Advance Australia "robocalls".
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In a shock decision, this week the AEC announced that automated calls a conservative lobby group sent to Canberrans before the last election did not breach electoral laws.
An electoral law expert has blasted that decision as "soft" and questioned the commission's justification.
The group, Advance Australia, left automated voicemail messages calling now Senator Pocock "an extreme Green activist" a few days before the election.
It also sent a different automated push-poll survey the day before the election, targeting The Canberra Times and twice calling Senator Pocock an "climate extremist candidate".
Neither call was authorised, Mr Pocock said - meaning, they did not say that Advance Australia had paid for the call.
Despite this, the commission has decided they did not breach electoral laws.
Senator Pocock has told The Canberra Times he will be asking the commission to revisit the controversial decision.
On Wednesday, the electoral commission said calls only reached Advance Australia "subscribers", who had opted-in to communications.
The Canberra Times then reported readers and staff members had received the push-poll call despite not being subscribers.
On Friday, the commission told The Canberra Times it made different decisions on the two automatic calls.
It maintained the first call was only received by "subscribers", but indicated the second was not subject to electoral laws because it did not contain "electoral matter".
"[The second call was] a survey style call regarding the coverage and operation of The Canberra Times," a spokesperson said.
"'Electoral matter' is the test as to whether a piece of communication needs to be authorised or not."
Electoral lawyer Keira Peacock said "electoral material is material which has a dominant purpose of seeking to influence the way voters vote in an election."
"If it's a paid advertisement ... and it contains electoral matter, then regardless of who you are, that needs to be authorised," she said.
Ms Peacock, from Marque lawyers, has represented the David Pocock Party.
The push-poll call made on the eve of the election, which the AEC suggested did not include electoral matter, included the following:
"The Canberra Times has encouraged Canberrans to vote for independents like climate extremist David Pocock in the Senate," a female voice said.
"The Canberra Times has written countless articles in support of Labor, the Greens and climate extremist candidate David Pocock."
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University of Queensland electoral law expert Professor Graeme Orr said if the push-poll calls were only made prior to the election, that would indicate they had breached electoral laws.
"If it really was just done over a couple of days before the election ... then I think the Electoral Commission has misinterpreted or misapplied the law to the facts here," he said.
"How can you really say the dominant purpose of that, if it's only done a few days before an election, is not to influence voters?
"I'd be very disappointed if the electoral commission had made a decision, if they knew that. I think it would be wrong. I think sometimes we're a bit soft here."
Dr Orr also said the commission may have also misinterpreted the law regarding the other call Advance Australia made.
"The idea of this internal communications exception is that it should be obvious it's an internal communication," he said.
"Really, it's just an emailing and call list ... Then certainly communications that are purely by phone, have to be tagged anyway, because otherwise, you don't know who it's coming from."
Senator Pocock will also be asking the electoral commission to prosecute Advance Australia over unauthorised corflutes that depicted him as a Greens member.
The commission had decided those did breach electoral laws.
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