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Speaker 1: We know the final report for the twenty twenty three

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Speaker 1: NT electoral boundary redistribution, which was scheduled for release this month,

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Speaker 1: it's been delayed due to an administrative oversight. That's according

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Speaker 1: to a statement issued by the Northern Territory Electoral Commission. Now,

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Speaker 1: the oversight relates to notices for the redistribution process not

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Speaker 1: being gazetted as required under section one hundred and thirty

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Speaker 1: seven of the Electoral Act of two thousand and four.

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Speaker 1: So legal advice provided by the Solicitor for the Northern

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Speaker 1: Territory confirmed that the redistribution process must begin again for

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Speaker 1: the redistribution to be lawful. The NT Electoral Commissioner Ian

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Speaker 1: Logan Nathan joins me in the studio right now.

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Speaker 2: Good morning to you.

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Speaker 3: In good morning Katie.

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Speaker 2: Now, Ian, what was the administrative oversight.

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Speaker 3: Katie, As you've just stated there, what the oversight was

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Speaker 3: that we failed to gazete the stages of the redistribution

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Speaker 3: and what that means is that the redistribution is in

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Speaker 3: many stages. We call for submissions, We receive submissions and

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Speaker 3: their placed on the website and people have an opportunity

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Speaker 3: to comment, and then we print a report We've printed

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Speaker 3: two reports in fact, and people have an opportunity to

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Speaker 3: comment on those reports. What's happened here is that we've

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Speaker 3: gone through this process. We've advertised in the paper. We

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Speaker 3: know we have an email list that includes all MPs,

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Speaker 3: all political stakeholders, all registered parties. We've received a number

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Speaker 3: of submissions. Everything is on the website. But what we

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Speaker 3: failed to do here, Katie, is gazette each stage of

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Speaker 3: that redistribution that as required by the act.

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Speaker 2: How has this happened?

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Speaker 1: I mean, this is certainly not the first redistribution that

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Speaker 1: you've ever seen, So how.

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Speaker 2: Has this happened?

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Speaker 3: Look, O, Katie, It's just an oversight. It's a mistake,

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Speaker 3: it's an error, and it shouldn't have happened. It's just

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Speaker 3: look sort of trying to go back and trying to

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Speaker 3: have a look at myself in terms of how this

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Speaker 3: has occurred. When we did local government read disbutions, we're

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Speaker 3: only required to gazette the final boundaries, so we just

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Speaker 3: had in our mind that is just the final boundaries

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Speaker 3: that need to be gazetted, and actually when we're looking

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Speaker 3: to finalize the report and looking to gazette the final boundaries,

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Speaker 3: that's when the error became clear that we actually needed

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Speaker 3: to do this at all stages of the redistribution.

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Speaker 2: And is it going to be a costly error?

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Speaker 1: Is this going to cost tax players?

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Speaker 3: There is going to be some cost, Kadie. The main

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Speaker 3: cost will be that we have to rerun these ads.

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Speaker 3: So there'll probably be about three or four ads that

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Speaker 3: need to be run rerun, and that'll be an additional cost.

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Speaker 1: So that'll be It's not going to be like a

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Speaker 1: huge amount of money by the sounds of things.

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Speaker 3: Oh look, we sort of estimate to run those ads

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Speaker 3: are going to be another fourteen or fifteen thousand dollars.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so there is still obviously a cost attached to it.

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Speaker 1: I mean, are you pretty disappointed that this has happened?

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Speaker 1: I know you take your work very seriously. Are you

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Speaker 1: pretty disappointed that this this this happens?

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Speaker 3: Look, Katie, I mean the answer the question is yes.

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Speaker 3: But it was a mistake. It was an oversight. You know,

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Speaker 3: it was not something that was done deliberately. You know,

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Speaker 3: I wish I wasn't here having to having to explain this,

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Speaker 3: but it's occurred. All we can do is take ownership

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Speaker 3: of it and work out where we go to from

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Speaker 3: here to finalize the process.

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Speaker 1: So what is the process now, Because we spoke to

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Speaker 1: Robin Lamley, the member for our Law and yesterday she

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Speaker 1: seemed quite concerned that this could drag out till sort

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Speaker 1: of March next year, and we're going to an election

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Speaker 1: August next year.

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Speaker 2: So what's the process now.

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Speaker 3: So the process is that we have to restart the

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Speaker 3: redistribution and we started that on Monday. In terms of

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Speaker 3: calling for submissions, the redistribution process allows for one or

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Speaker 3: two reports.

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Speaker 2: If it's two reports.

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Speaker 3: Then it'll stretch it out. We're hoping that it's not

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Speaker 3: given that really the Redistribution Committee has sort of made

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Speaker 3: its position pretty clear in all the reports we've published

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Speaker 3: so far. So if we can keep it just to

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Speaker 3: one report and get comments on that report, we're hoping

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Speaker 3: that the final report can be released in December.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Well, I mean I think that that makes quite

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Speaker 1: a big difference if you're talking December or March next year.

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Speaker 1: I would think that if it's done by December this year,

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Speaker 1: that does give political candidates and also voters plenty of

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Speaker 1: time to work out what those electrics are going to

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Speaker 1: look like, so they know who they're voting for or

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Speaker 1: who's putting their hand up to vote, because no doubt

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Speaker 1: for those political parties it's going to make a difference

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Speaker 1: too in terms of choosing candidates.

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Speaker 3: Look, you know, certainly there's some inconvenience to the political

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Speaker 3: parties and independent MPs and other candidates who are contemplating

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Speaker 3: running in.

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Speaker 2: The election next year.

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Speaker 3: All I can do is apologize for that and say

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Speaker 3: that you know, we take responsibility for this and we're

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Speaker 3: going to try to hopefully get the process completed by

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Speaker 3: the end of the year.

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Speaker 1: And the Member for Aura lun reckons that the Northern

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Speaker 1: Territory Electoral Commission is underfunded and there needs to be

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Speaker 1: a review. Do you have enough funding to perform your duties?

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Speaker 3: Look, Katian, in relation to this era, it's really it's

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Speaker 3: not related to funding. It's just something we've made a mistake.

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Speaker 3: So I just want to sort of be clear about that.

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Speaker 3: Looking in relation to funding, certainly, you know it's a

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Speaker 3: type fiscal climate in the Northern Territory, you know, for

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Speaker 3: the bureaucracy. If we had more funds, we certainly could

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Speaker 3: do more activities. And certainly in terms of any inquiry,

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Speaker 3: we're an independent statute, independent statute, sorry, independent statutory authority.

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Speaker 3: We're open and we're transparent and so you know, we

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Speaker 3: would welcome any inquiry into any aspect of the work

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Speaker 3: that we do.

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Speaker 1: I guess what she was getting to though, as well,

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Speaker 1: is the fact that the voter turnout for recent recent

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Speaker 1: elections has been quite low and whether you've actually got

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Speaker 1: the funding that you need and the resources that you're

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Speaker 1: required to be able to get as many people to

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Speaker 1: the polling booths as possible.

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Speaker 3: So, Katie, in relation to the funding for elections, For

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Speaker 3: territory elections, they're funded by the territory government, you know,

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Speaker 3: by elections, and in terms of local government they're funded

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Speaker 3: by the councils. So and certainly in terms of promoting

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Speaker 3: the elections, you know, we do radio advertising, we do

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Speaker 3: SMS and emails, we have banners, and certainly we do

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Speaker 3: a lot of social media advertising, targeted social media advertising.

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Speaker 3: So we're trying to inform the electric you know, could

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Speaker 3: we do more, yes, But I think it's a wider

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Speaker 3: issue than that. I think that there's a level of

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Speaker 3: disengagement in the political and electoral process. This isn't just

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Speaker 3: an issue in the Northern territory. You know, it's an

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Speaker 3: issue nationwide, but certainly in the territory we've seen notable

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Speaker 3: declines and as you said at you know, recent elections

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Speaker 3: in Alice Springs, in Catherine and in Darn we've had

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Speaker 3: turnouts of under fifty percent. That isn't the norm. And

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Speaker 3: you know, there's there's some wider issues here that you know,

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Speaker 3: some of it relates to the actual commission and some

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Speaker 3: of it rate some wider societal issues that need to

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Speaker 3: be understood.

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Speaker 1: Is there going to be some pretty serious work before

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Speaker 1: the next Northern Territory election to try to get as

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Speaker 1: many people there to turn up and.

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Speaker 2: Vote, Katie.

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Speaker 3: The astron Electoral Commission looks after the role and they

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Speaker 3: have done a significant amount of work in the lead

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Speaker 3: up to the referendum to get more people on the

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Speaker 3: electoral role. There's one hundred and fifty two thousand people

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Speaker 3: on the electoral role at the moment and that's ten

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Speaker 3: thousand more than the last territory elections, so that's a

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Speaker 3: significant increase. The difficulty is how do we get territoriums

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Speaker 3: to the polling booth and to vote. And certainly, you

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Speaker 3: know we're going to encourage them, We're certainly going to

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Speaker 3: look at our voter services that we provide. You know,

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Speaker 3: we're trying to do things in terms of, you know,

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Speaker 3: having early voting and anybody can early vote, anybody can

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Speaker 3: postal vote. At the last local government elections we had

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Speaker 3: a number of communities that had an early voting services,

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Speaker 3: so we're certainly trying to do that, but it doesn't

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Speaker 3: seem to be translating to more people turning up at

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Speaker 3: the ballot box. The reality is that we have more

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Speaker 3: territorials on the electoral role than ever before, but a

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Speaker 3: lower percentage actually voting.

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Speaker 1: Well, look, I can probably comment on why I think

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Speaker 1: they may or may not be turning up to vote,

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Speaker 1: but I don't think that you're able to, So we

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Speaker 1: might leave that there. In logan Nathan, the Northern Territory

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Speaker 1: Electoral Commissioner, thank you so much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 3: Thank you, Katy