MOTHERS shielding their children, volunteers reduced to tears, and voters describing polling places as a “warzone” were among the confronting lived experiences shared at a public hearing in Ipswich last week, as a parliamentary inquiry examined the conduct of the 2025 Federal Election.
The hearing, convened by the Federal Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters (JSCEM), formed part of its national review into how the election was run and brought local voters and campaign volunteers face-to-face with some of the country’s leading political experts.
Much of the testimony focused on allegations of intimidation, harassment and aggressive campaigning in the electorate of Blair.
Witnesses told the inquiry it appeared large numbers of members of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, also known as the Exclusive Brethren, had been recruited from outside the electorate to campaign for the Liberal National Party and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party.
Several voters and volunteers described behaviour at polling booths as aggressive, intimidating and offensive.
One female voter told the committee she was forced to pick up her child and “run the gauntlet” of young male LNP campaigners yelling at her to take a how-to-vote card.
Female voters and Labor volunteers staffing the Riverlink pre-poll booth said they were subjected to lewd, sexist and degrading remarks about their bodies by male LNP and One Nation campaigners.
Former Labor State Member for Ipswich Rachel Nolan told the hearing the 2025 election was unlike any she had experienced.
On broader structural issues, Professor John Cole and Adjunct Associate Professor John Mickel argued that rapid population growth in electorates such as Blair warranted an increase in the size of the federal Parliament to ensure fair representation.
The hearing featured testimony from prominent academics and former political leaders.
The committee has also received written submissions from community members, political participants and experts, and will deliver its findings to Parliament once the review is complete.
