I’m from Australia, and here I know that it’s a fairly common misconception that the AEC vote counting staff are volunteers. But they’re not. They’re hired to work on the day, and only on the day, with a little online training beforehand. They’re paid minimum wage at casual loading rates. Usually they work the whole day issuing votes and then switch to counting once polls have closed. There are also “scrutineers”, who are volunteers (IIRC they legally must be volunteers, not paid) representing the candidates/parties, who watch the counting process and may challenge how a ballot has been counted, but may not ever touch.
Hmm, how confident are you in that?
I’m from Australia, and here I know that it’s a fairly common misconception that the AEC vote counting staff are volunteers. But they’re not. They’re hired to work on the day, and only on the day, with a little online training beforehand. They’re paid minimum wage at casual loading rates. Usually they work the whole day issuing votes and then switch to counting once polls have closed. There are also “scrutineers”, who are volunteers (IIRC they legally must be volunteers, not paid) representing the candidates/parties, who watch the counting process and may challenge how a ballot has been counted, but may not ever touch.