The good news is that our application for party registration with the Australian Electoral Commission is now in the final stages. The public notification period to allow objections ends on Monday 11 April. You may have seen the notification in the press recently.

It usually then takes seven days for the AEC to finalise a registration and the AEC has assured us that they will process our application as quickly as possible. In order for us to run candidates in the coming election we must be registered before the government calls the election.

The bad news is that the last date that the Government can call the election is Monday, 18 April. If the election is called earlier than 18 April or the AEC takes more than five working days to process our application (they promise 7 days), Voices for the Senate will not be registered in time for this election.

This would be a great disappointment to us and our 2000 members, to our Victorian Candidate and to the Voices groups who have given their time and commitment to the candidate selection process for their states’ Senate seats.

We will provide further updates as they come in. Meanwhile, thanks for all the support we have received to date. Rest assured that Voices for the Senate is here for the duration.