Voters verdict on unsolicited texts warrants a response

September 26, 2021 â€" 12.15am

The Australian people have spoken: “Please stop texting us, Craig.”

Craig Kelly, the leader of Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party, revealed himself as a text pest recently when he contacted millions of Australians via their smartphones.

United Australia Party MP Craig Kelly says he is “absolutely” not sorry about sending unsolicited text messages to voters spruiking his anti-lockdown policies.Credit:Rohan Thomson

The former Liberal Party MP, and current member for the seat of Hughes in Sydney’s south, injected a shot of political propaganda straight into the phones of millions of randomly selected Australian voters.

And they didn’t like it.

As The Age reported at the time, the Australian Media and Communications Authority received hundreds of complaints about the texts.

It is an especially sensitive issue, because Mr Kelly, who has been promoting ivermectin as an alternative treatment for COVID-19, has been accused of spreading misinformation about COVID-19 by misleading people about deaths attributed to vaccination.

And clearly, Mr Kelly’s efforts have struck a nerve. The Age’s Resolve Political Monitor has found a very high level of voter support for reform of the laws that allow political parties to spam them.

Of the 1600 respondents, 42 per cent said they had received a UAP text. A decisive 76 per cent agreed political parties should not be allowed to send automated text messages.

The survey also asked if party political “robocalls” should be junked â€" and 80 per cent said yes. The same number believe political parties should be subject to the full force of the Privacy Act.

Amid a sea of marketing messages on TV, radio and the internet, the direct text message or robocall is a powerful way to fish for potential supporters â€" as well as annoy millions of people trying to get on with their daily lives without being bothered by politicians.

Mr Kelly’s texting frenzy has had the useful â€" if unintended â€" effect of rekindling an important debate about the limits of political campaigning in Australia.

Our political parties currently enjoy a large degree of latitude when it comes to communicating with voters.

Registered political parties are, for example, exempt from the Privacy Act, which allows them to collect and store data on voters. The Spam Act allows them to send unsolicited messages to voters if they want to. They can even sidestep the Do Not Call Register and contact people who have otherwise chosen not to be contacted by companies and marketing agencies.

In some ways this makes sense because political communication is important, especially in the lead up to an election, and people who seek Australians’ votes need to be able to inform the public about what they stand for â€" and why.

As The Sunday Age has previously reported, Australians are being inundated by an increasing number of spam texts and ghost calls, and it has made them less trusting of unsolicited messages and increasingly prickly about their privacy â€" especially when their personal mobile number is involved.

The British anthropologist Daniel Miller has explained: “The smartphone is no longer just a device that we use, it’s become the place where we live” â€" and we’re not keen on letting just anyone enter our digital premises.

At the last federal election, concerns were raised about Mr Palmer’s $60 million election advertising blitz. Mr Kelly’s texts show the UAP is willing to spend big to exert its influence at the next election, too.

Today’s poll reveals voters are pretty much united in their annoyance about these mass text messages. As such, it’s time for authorities to re-examine how the rules around privacy and communication apply to political parties to ensure democratic debate takes place without overstepping people’s boundaries.

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