Double the options, double the cost: Why ratepayers in the Town of Cambridge paid more for their voting rights

A quarter of the people who bothered to vote at last year’s Town of Cambridge election did so by demanding a postal vote, rather than taking up the in-person option strongly favoured by former mayor Keri Shannon. And it can be revealed the council’s decision to embrace two methods of voting meant last October’s election cost Cambridge ratepayers more than twice as much as the previous election in 2021, with nearly $50,000 spent marketing the different voting options and more than $37,000 on additional staff costs. Ms Shannon led the council move to offer voters a chance to roll up at a local election booth on October 21, 2023, as is the norm at State and Federal elections but is less common at local government level, where voting is not compulsory. Cambridge also made available the tried-and-tested method of postal voting — but left the onus on individual ratepayers to request a postal vote package in advance, rather than be automatically delivered one. A Town of Cambridge wrap-of-election findings revealed far more voters took up that offer than had been expected. The WA Electoral Commission issued 1601 postal vote packages — far higher than the 300 the council estimated would be needed and also part of the reason the actual election cost of $215,000 was much higher than the $130,000 estimated charge. Of those, 1347 packages were returned, accounting for 25 per cent of the total votes cast. In a report to the Cambridge council, town staff described the hybrid approach to voting methodology as an “increased administrative burden for the town” that cost about 426 staff hours. “This process involved processing the requests and then forwarding to the WAEC for a once-off registration on a weekly basis,” the report explained. “WAEC staff were required to manually print, collate and post each postal voting package.” The extra cost and options did not lead to more voter involvement in October’s election. Only about 26 per cent of Cambridge ratepayers voted, down marginally from the 2021 turnout. It was also the low mark across the six western suburbs councils that held polls last October. The council report put the cost per elector of running a hybrid election at $10.44, considerably higher than in 2021 when the figure was $4.72. Then-councillor Gary Mack defeated Ms Shannon for the position of mayor at the election. Ms Shannon has since gone on to be appointed chief executive of the City of Nedlands. The council will wait until next year to finalise how voting will be done at its next local government election, which is set to occur in October 2025.