Political firebrand Craig Kelly has lashed his bunfight with the Australian Electoral Commission over the size of the “authorisation” line on some of his election advertising as a waste of taxpayers’ money after it spilled into a courtroom on Monday.
The former United Australian Party MP says he was sent on a wild chase across his southern Sydney electorate in the lead-up to last year’s federal election after being told by the AEC that some of his posters did not comply with electoral laws.
The AEC has brought legal action against Mr Kelly in the Federal Court, alleging that the “authorisation” line displayed on some his posters, sandwich boards and corflutes in the lead-up to the May 2022 poll were too small.
Barrister Christopher Tran, representing the AEC, told Justice Steven Rares on Monday that Mr Kelly’s office printed one run of signs in March and early April on which the authorisation was printed down the bottom in size eight font.
On a second run, which was printed in May, the authorisation line was in 24-point font.
Mr Tran told the hearing that in the lead-up to the election, the first lot of signs were still in use at pre-polling booths.
He told the court the AEC found 22 alleged contraventions.
The AEC is seeking penalties but Mr Kelly is defending the lawsuit and on Monday afternoon took the witness stand in the Federal Court in Sydney.
His barrister Christopher Ward SC told the court that according to AEC requirements, the authorisation line – which lists the person who approved the advertising and their address – must be “reasonably prominent”.
Dr Ward told the court that Mr Kelly used the same font size when he was a member of the Liberal Party prior to his defection to the UAP.
He also said photos of Mr Kelly’s signs – taken by the AEC at polling booths across the Hughes electorate – showed other political parties using similarly sized fonts.
“You can walk up to about a metre from all of these signs and you can read it,” Dr Ward said, adding that an ordinary person didn’t need a magnifying glass to read the message.
Mr Kelly is arguing that his signs complied with political and print industry standards.
Dr Ward also said that when Mr Kelly’s office was alerted by the AEC that some of the signs, with the eight-point font authorisation line, were still in circulation, it refused to tell him at which polling booth.
“There was an exchange of correspondence over some days between Mr Kelly’s solicitor and the AEC in which they first refused to identify where any of these allegedly offending signs were located,” Dr Ward told the court.
“So … he was left to race around the electorate with his staff and attempt to spot any that were still out there.”
Mr Kelly, who lost the seat of Hughes at last year’s election, has previously criticised the lawsuit, describing it as “malicious prosecution” and a “stitch up”.
On Monday he tweeted: “I wonder what this (is) costing the taxpayer?”
Mr Kelly on Monday afternoon took the witness stand and told the court that when he received an email from the AEC with a photo of one of the allegedly offending signs, he thought it was a “joke” because the images were taken from so far away and were of such low resolution.
“I remember going out from my office and taking a photograph of the signs across the road that were my competitors’ sign and saying ‘well if I’m in breach I want to register a complaint about my competitors because their signs are just as legible as mine’,” Mr Kelly told the court.
He said that after receiving correspondence from the AEC alleging he had breached electoral laws, he ordered a second run of corflutes, with the authorisation message in larger font.
He also ordered stickers, which were meant to be placed over the allegedly offending signs to rectify them.
He said that it was hard to take some of the original signs out of circulation because his staff would report to him that they were often vandalised or stolen as soon as they were put out.
The hearing continues on Tuesday.