28 THE GEORGIAN LABOUR PARTY v. GEORGIA JUDGMENT parliamentary election of 28 March 2004 was conducted more fairly than the previous one. The Government invited the Court to take into account the international election observers’ appraisals in this regard (see paragraph 50 above). 77. According to the Government, the applicant party did not submit any evidence in support of the allegation that the change in the voter registration system had violated any of its rights under Article 3 of Protocol No. 1. Finally, they argued that the authorities should be granted a wide margin of appreciation in the choice of a voter registration system. 2. The applicant party’s submissions 78. The applicant party replied that the system of voter registration, as amended by CEC Decree no. 30/2004 of 27 February 2004, undermined the effectiveness and practicability of the guarantee of free elections set out in Article 3 of Protocol No. 1. 79. In the opinion of the applicant party, the above-mentioned Decree also breached Articles 9 and 10 of the EC. In particular, Article 9 § 5 of the EC provided that the electoral roll of voters should be compiled not on the initiative of voters but on the basis of the data available at the relevant State agencies. Furthermore, Article 9 § 8 of the EC provided that the electoral administration should review the general electoral roll instead of the voters. Finally, the impugned Decree excluded ab initio all voters mentioned in Article 10 of the EC – those, for example, who, on election day, were being held in police custody or pre-trial detention, were in hospital, etc. – as they could not comply with the procedure for preliminary registration. 80. According to the applicant party, by introducing a deliberately aberrant system of voter registration contrary to the provisions of the EC, the CEC not only facilitated various possibilities of electoral fraud – voters could, for example, register in different electoral precincts and thus cast their vote more than once, whereas others who had failed to comply with the preliminary registration were unable to cast a vote – it also shifted the burden of registration from the State onto the voters. This, in turn, was not compatible with the Contracting State’s positive obligations under Article 3 of Protocol No. 1. Moreover, the sudden change in the rules on registration to which voters had been accustomed by virtue of the long-standing electoral legislation resulted in a reduction of the latter’s electoral activity. 81. Lastly, the applicant party denounced as untrue the Government’s argument that Parliament had been unable to function normally because of time constraints, referring to the fact that in February 2004 the legislative body examined and approved a substantial package of important constitutional amendments.