R v Pearson; Ex parte Sipka, was a landmark Australian court case decided in the High Court of Australia on 24 February 1983. It concerned section 41 of the Australian Constitution, and the question of whether four people eligible to vote in New South Wales could be prevented from voting at the federal level by a federal law which closed registration to vote on the day that the writs of election were issued. The court decided that they could, adopting a narrow interpretation of section 41, and therefore finding that there is no express constitutional right to vote in Australia. Background to the case In 1983, section 45 of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 provided that: 45 (a) Claims for enrolment... which are received by the Registrar after six o'clock in the afternoon of the day of the issue of the writ for an election shall not be registered until after the close of polling at the election. This had the effect of closing the electoral roll on the day when an election was called, so that anyone who had not registered before it was called would not be able to vote. Federal elections in Australia are held at irregular intervals, but are usually about three years apart. However, in 1983, Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser was keen to call an early election. Popular union leader Bob Hawke had been elected to the Australian House of Representatives in the 1980 election, for the Australian Labor Party (ALP), and was moving to challenge the ALP leader Bill Hayden. Fraser thought his chances were better against Hayden than against Hawke, and so he wanted to hold the election before Hawke could take over the leadership. Fraser requested a double dissolution election (an election for the entire Parliament of Australia, including both tranches of Senators), which was granted by Governor-General of Australia Ninian Stephen on 3 February, with the election date set for 5 March. The writs were issued on 4 February, which meant that the electoral roll was effectively closed at 6 o'clock on that day. Jarka Sipka, Rudolf Kleppich, Murray Chapman and Sarah Walters were four people from New South Wales who were entitled to vote in New South Wales elections, but had not enrolled to vote in federal elections. When they applied to be put on the electoral roll, the Registrar refused to put their names on the roll until