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RNZ News
6 days ago
- Politics
- RNZ News
Labour asks Auditor-General to investigate electoral roll complaints
Labour's Duncan Webb wants the Auditor-General to investigate reports of enrolment issues at the Electoral Commission. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone Labour MP Duncan Webb has asked the Auditor-General to investigate reports of enrolment issues] at the Electoral Commission. Last week, RNZ spoke to voters who reported they had been moved off the Māori roll, or could not find themselves on any electoral roll. The Electoral Commission has responded, saying it was likely those who could not find their details online were on the "dormant role". The dormant role lists voters who have lost touch with the commission and need to update their address before their record shows up on Chief Electoral Officer Karl Le Quesne has been adamant the commission is not changing people's enrolment details without their consent. But prospective voters, such as former journalist Taryn Utiger, have told RNZ she updated her details as recently as a month ago and still could not find her record. When RNZ approached the Electoral Commission about Utiger's case, it said it could not comment on an individual's enrolment record. Webb wrote to the Office of the Auditor-General on Monday afternoon, asking for an investigation to "resolve any doubt on the matter one way or the other". He said he had received reports of enrolment issues himself that he could not dismiss on the basis of the comment provided by the commission. "It appears that there are two possibilities as to how this is occurring. First, there have been people inappropriately placed on the dormant roll. "Second, the information technology system adopted by the Commission has a poor human interface that makes it error prone or unusable," the letter reads. On the dormant roll, Webb said he wanted the Auditor-General to check the commission was only placing people on this role when it needed to. "I am concerned that the steps that the Commission is taking under s 89G(2) are not sufficiently rigorous to ensure that people are not being placed on the dormant roll inappropriately. "While the Commission notes that "we will try to contact you by email or text to ask you to update your details" it is not clear how this is done, or what efforts are used to ensure that the best contact details are used. I also note that in the current era an email or text with a "click on this link" message is unlikely to be responded to," the letter reads. On the technology system, Webb said it was unreasonable to expect people to locate their electoral record online by using their exact name and address. "I am concerned that this is a practical hurdle that inappropriately obstructs people seeking to update or confirm their enrolment. In particular, address information is now auto-populated in an accepted format in almost all applications. "If the Commission is using software which cannot recognise that Avenue and Ave are the same, or that Saint Albans and St Albans are the same suburb, this is a very significant flaw in the system, "For the Commission to expect electors to remember how they spelt such words, or whether they included a suburb or only their city/town in the address, is an example of an unworkable and outdated human interface of the technology." Webb said it was clear the enrolment system was not working as expected and a detailed inquiry was required to establish exactly what issues, if any, there were. "The integrity of the electoral system is fundamental to our democracy. Your inquiry will ensure continued confidence in the system." The Commission said it was taking people's concerns seriously and anyone with questions about their enrolment could call freephone 0800 36 76 56 or email enquiries@ "We continue to monitor our systems and they are running as they should be. In the week to Sunday 3 August we received 38,435 enrolments and updates and 91 percent of these were online." "It's good that people are checking their enrolment details, and we understand the frustration when you can't find your record. We have heard the feedback and will look at how we can improve the experience for people. "The search on our website to find your enrolment record is strict to maintain voter privacy and ensure that a person can only see the record we hold for them." The Office of the Auditor-General confirmed it was considering whether or not it would carry out any inquiry work, including whether the issues raised by Webb fell within its mandate. "We cannot comment further while this process is under way," a spokesperson said. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
NZ Herald
24-07-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Government warned of even longer election counts without reforms, but Māori and young people likely to be hit hard by change
Goldsmith, along with the rest of the coalition, expressed frustration at the length of the count at the last election, and asked officials to look at changes. 'If we leave things as they are, it could well take even longer in future elections. The 20-day timeframe for a final result will likely already be challenging to achieve at the next election without changes,' Goldsmith said. Labour and the Greens criticised the changes, with Labour's justice spokesman Duncan Webb saying they were an 'appalling change that will make it harder for a lot of people to exercise their democratic right'. A Regulatory Impact Statement from the Ministry of Justice said there had been an explosion in special votes as more and more people enrolled or updated their details on the day they voted. There were about 300,000 to 350,000 of these votes at the last election. In the 2023 election, 602,000 votes cast were special votes, or about 20.9% of all votes. If nothing were to change, the Electoral Commission forecasts this to rise to 739,000 special votes in the 2026 election, or 24% of the total. By the 2032 election, the Electoral Commission forecasts 999,000 special votes, or 30% of the total. Officials noted a general trend towards people getting their enrolment sorted far later in the cycle, with 66% of enrolment 'transactions' in the 2023 election occurring after writ day, the Governor-General's official instruction to hold an election. This compared to 52% in 2017 and 42% in 2020. The change may go deeper than mere laziness. Officials said that New Zealanders move around a lot more than in the past. At the last census, about a fifth of people had lived in their house for a year or less and 53% of people had lived in their house for less than five years. Moving house more means updating your enrolment details more. If people do this on the day, it means more special votes and a longer count. Officials shared Goldsmith's concern about ballooning numbers of special votes leading to a longer counting period. If a third of votes were special votes, the count could take longer than it does now — although they did not estimate a time. They warned that a longer vote count and more special votes could delay the start of coalition negotiations prolonging uncertainty and affecting everything from the functioning of charities to investment in the economy. 'Special votes often affect the final number of seats allocated to parties. For that reason, government formation negotiations may be constrained until special votes have been counted,' officials said. 'The level of uncertainty about election outcomes will always depend on how close the results are for each election. 'Likewise, the degree to which parties may be able to progress government formation negotiations while awaiting the official results will depend on the closeness of the results as well as other political considerations,' officials said. '[E]lections are by nature a time of uncertainty in democracies, and there is value in a timely and smooth transfer of power following an election. A change of government and associated changes in policies can have broad impacts — for example, on the general public, Māori, businesses, the voluntary sector, public services and more. 'Some international studies have indicated that political uncertainty around national elections can have an impact on economic factors, such as reduced investment and spending,' officials said. These challenges are particularly acute for New Zealand, which because of the coalition negotiations period that is almost guaranteed by an MMP election, will always have a period of post-election uncertainty. New Zealand also has relatively short three-year terms, meaning elections come around frequently. Campaigns take about six weeks from the last day of Parliament to election day. If the vote count takes three weeks and coalition negotiations take another five, then New Zealand will spend about one month in every 20 either in the midst of an election campaign or waiting for a government to be formed — the period of uncertainty is even longer considering how little governments tend to do between delivering their final budget and getting out on the hustings. Officials also warned the pressures of these enormous special vote counts could lead to errors, undermining confidence in the electoral system. A move to different counting methods might be desirable. The current model is 'largely manual', officials said. 'This model may be nearing the end of its capacity to cope with increasing volume and processing requirements,' they said. Officials warned the changes could have serious consequences on turnout. The Electoral Commission advised that special votes are more likely to come from areas with high Māori, Asian, and Pacific communities. Younger people are also far more likely to cast special votes — particularly first-time voters. In 2023, 33% of 18- to 19-year-old voters enrolled or updated their details during the voting period, including 48% of Māori voters aged 18 to 19. In 2023, 17.3% of Māori voters updated their details or enrolled during the voting period. The same figure for the general population is 18.9%. Officials raised some concerns about whether the changes might raise Treaty of Waitangi problems, as the Treaty 'provides for equal citizenship rights for Māori'. 'These rights include the right to political representation. Setting an earlier enrolment deadline will increase the administrative requirements to exercise this right,' they said. Officials were also concerned that based on 'previous trends' there may be an 'increased likelihood' that votes cast by Māori would be disallowed at a higher rate than those cast by non-Māori, depending on how people responded to the new deadline for updating their details. As part of Goldsmith's changes, the Government will introduce automatic enrolment updates, making it more likely for people to have their enrolments kept current automatically. Officials recommended this option on its own as their preferred method to reduce vote counting timeframes. Instead, it was paired with decisions to close enrolment 13 days before election day. Officials also considered closing enrolment on writ day and requiring people to vote in their electorate, rather than casting a vote from somewhere else.
Newsroom
24-07-2025
- Politics
- Newsroom
Hundreds of thousands of voters affected by planned electoral changes
A new electoral law change would remove same-day voting and late enrolments, as well as impacting the votes of those who haven't updated their physical address ahead of the advanced voting period. The Government has moved ahead with sweeping voting changes that will restrict who can vote and when people can enrol. The Electoral Amendment Bill, introduced to Parliament on Thursday, not only scraps same-day voter enrolment, but stops people from enrolling to vote during the advanced voting period. During the 2023 election almost 100,000 people enrolled to vote during that 12-day period, with the number of people enrolling and voting late increasing at each election. The advanced voting period was previously set by the Electoral Commission. The bill proposes that it now be a set 12 days. Following the last election, the Electoral Commission raised issues with the cost and administrative burden of processing so many special votes and late enrolments. However, Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb previously told Newsroom that administrative cost was not a valid reason for restricting the number of people who could access their democratic right to vote. The proposed changes, championed by Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith, would also stop people from changing their voter registration details during that advanced voting period. In 2023, 134,000 people changed their physical address and changed electorates during that voting period. That would no longer be allowed if this bill were to pass, meaning if someone were to move to another electorate during that 12-day period (or had not updated their address details prior to the advanced voting period) their party vote would be counted, but their electorate vote would be invalid. Additionally, it would be considered an offence to bribe someone to switch between the Māori and general roll. These changes come in the wake of earlier changes that banned all prisoners from voting in general elections. Earlier this year, Cabinet agreed to introduce legislation that would remove voting rights from those sentenced to prison for up to three years, in a move that the Supreme Court has already said breaches human rights law. The move, signed off on in April, essentially reverses legislation passed by the Labour-led coalition government in 2020 – a law that NZ First supported at the time. It comes despite the Independent Electoral Commission recommending that all prisoners – not just those serving a term of less than three years – should be allowed to vote. Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith ruled out this recommendation when the review's final report was released last year. These decisions to further restrict voter eligibility and enrolment appear to have been made at the same time, with Goldsmith previously telling Newsroom he had made a decision on what to do with same-day voter registration. However, he refused to announce what those changes were before now. Alongside the prisoner voting ban, Cabinet is proposing to change rules for people detained in hospitals or secure forensic facilities under compulsory mental health or intellectual disability orders, making them eligible to vote. This ban currently captures people who had not been convicted of committing a criminal act, but have been detained in a facility or hospital for three or more years. These people would now be eligible to vote. This proposal was signalled earlier in the year, but the minister took further advice before deciding on the eligibility of those who were deemed to suffer from a mental illness or distress. In a press release, Goldsmith said allowing late enrolments was well-intentioned but placed too much strain on the system. 'If we leave things as they are, it could well take even longer in future elections. The 20-day timeframe for a final result will likely already be challenging to achieve at the next election without changes.' He also noted the donation disclosure threshold had increased from $5000 to $6000 to adjust for inflation. Goldsmith categorised these changes as 'significant, but necessary'. He said it took too long to get the final results and then form a government, following election day. He also said that Kiwis had been sent mixed messages from the Electoral Commission, which encouraged people to enrol while also allowing people to enrol up to, and on, election day. Officails warned Goldsmith the changes could be seen as a 'step backwards for accessibility'. 'Closing enrolment earlier could harm confidence and trust if people are not able to vote because they missed the deadline or if more votes are disallowed.' Electoral Commission data indicated Māori could be disproportionately impacted. Special votes were more likely to come from areas with larger proportions of Māori, Asian and Pasifika communities. Younger people were also more likely to cast a special vote. In 2023, 17.3 percent of Māori voters updated their details or enrolled during the voting period, compared to 9.8 percent of non-Māori. That percentage was even higher for voters on the Māori roll, at 18.9 percent. Meanwhile, 48 percent of Māori voters aged 18 to 19 enrolled of updated their details during the voting period. 'These trends may indicate that these communities are more likely to be affected by an earlier enrolment deadline,' officials said. Goldsmith said he was confident Māori voters would be able to get themselves enrolled ahead of the 12-day advanced voting period. 'If people are making the argument that Māori are less capable of getting enrolled and participating, I just don't agree with that.' Act Party leader David Seymour said it was a responsibility to be on the electoral roll. 'If you can't be bothered doing that, maybe you don't care so much,' he said. 'When you vote, you're voting to give huge power to tax people's money make rules restricting their lives. Frankly, I'm a bit sick of dropkicks that can't get themselves organised and to follow the law which registering to vote is a legal requirement, then going along and voting to tax away hard working people's money and have people that make laws that restrict their freedoms, actually rights come with some responsibilities.' NZ First leader Winston Peters said politicians were entitled to know who voters were ahead of the election. 'Because when you go on a campaign, you should know who your constituency is. And people are turning up on election day with no idea what the campaign was all about. We've got no idea who they are. We don't know how to talk politics to them or to make them part of the electoral process, and yet, seemingly, they are able to vote. That can't be right … We're entitled to know what the voters think about us, because we know who they are … otherwise, what's the campaign about?' Labour Party justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said tens of thousands of people would miss out on exercising their democratic right to vote if these 'despicable' proposed changes became law. 'This is an appalling change that will make it harder for a lot of people to exercise their democratic right,' he said. 'The Government's justification is the speed of results. That is no reason to make it harder for people to vote in the first place. Voter turnout should be encouraged, with changes to support that. People should not be shut out, he said. Green Party democracy and electoral reform spokesperson Celia Wade-Brown said the Government's proposed changes would weaken democracy by restricting voting rights. If the Green party was in government it would restore the right to vote for all New Zealanders – including prisoners – restore same-day enrolment, and reform election funding in line with the recommendations of the Independent Electoral Review.
RNZ News
19-07-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
Are our politicians safe from threats and 'free to lead'?
Bolstering the safety of MPs is something the Parliamentary Service have been working on this Parliamentary term. Photo: VNP / Daniela Maoate-Cox Online abuse has become part of the job for many politicians, MPs said at a panel this week, hosted by Manatū Wāhine Ministry for Women, marking the launch of the Free to Lead campaign. MPs from both Labour and National spoke candidly about their experience of online harm, and how it's changing our political landscape. Anyone who uses the internet will know that a comments section can be a pretty toxic place, perhaps even more so when the topic is politics. Aotearoa has always prided itself on how accessible our elected officials are, but the number of dodgy, abusive, or even violent interactions experienced by MPs has quietly increased. Thirty years ago being an elected official meant facing criticism from the media, political opponents and sometimes the odd heckler in public. These days an MP can wake up, check their phone and see a stream of negative comments, some deeply personal, even bordering on threatening. Labour's Duncan Webb and National's Greg Fleming said that as males, their experience of abuse had rarely been personal and most attacks were on their political ideas or beliefs. Studies both here and abroad confirm what many have long suspected - that female officials are being disproportionately targeted. "This is a gendered issue, right?" said Webb. "And sure, I've had nasty comments and I've had incidents at markets and so on, but the power dynamics are entirely different. So I don't think it can really be compared effectively. I am not deeply affected by most of the comments I see. It's a very rare day where it really hurts. But I understand entirely that's not the case for everyone else." National's Nancy Lu said disinformation spread online about her marriage during an election campaign, and there wasn't an obvious way to combat the claims. "We don't have a way to fight back. It's not like I can just stand up in front of Parliament and …have a press conference [to] make it clear. ...So it got us thinking for quite some time in terms of what we do to protect ourselves - me and [my husband]. He's also in a fulltime job, our children, our family; what tools do we have to fight back? We're still searching." Labour MP Ingrid Leary says that there's a global trend of politicians, especially women, being increasingly exposed to harm, both online and in person. "We've had women MPs in Sri Lanka, where there have been attempts to set them on fire, we've had a woman MP in the UK shot . Recently, we had Shane Jones and his wife accosted at the airport . "We are seeing the spillover and the normalisation of hate speech-type behaviours coming into the physical space. So all the evidence and trends would suggest that women MPs in particular are less safe than they were years ago." So where has this new-found animosity towards lawmakers come from? National's Greg Fleming mused that perhaps the uniquely adversarial environment at Parliament is partly to blame. "We are, as political leaders, culture makers arguably, first and foremost. I think sometimes we have almost more effect at making culture than we do at making legislation. And I think we could do a much better job of focusing on playing the ball, not the man, because we do end up legitimising it." Leary agreed, "I think all of us have a role to play in terms of managing our own value system and how we conduct ourselves online. …Some of the behaviours could be seen to contribute to the vitriol that is being hurled at politicians, because people don't necessarily see that some of this is theatre and is not real life." Fleming said that this political 'theatre', increasingly referred to as toxic, acts as a deterrent to attracting the best and brightest to pursue a career in politics. Chief executive of the Parliamentary Service Rafael Gonzalez-Montero appearing before a select committee. Photo: VNP / Phil Smith Responsibility for the safety of MPs lies with the Parliamentary Service, one of the two agencies tasked with running Parliament. Chief executive Rafael Gonzalez-Montero says during his time in the role, there has been "a lot more volatility in the threat landscape, both online and in the physical world". Currently, the Parliamentary Service liaise with the police when an MP is threatened, but Gonzalez-Montero says "it's very difficult to do anything in advance, so unfortunately we are the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff". Bolstering the safety of MPs is something the Parliamentary Service have been working on this Parliamentary term, including providing a risk assessment service for MPs attending events in the community. "We are always looking at ways to keep our members safe - and especially the staff that work in the electorate and community offices safe. So we've been looking around what happens all over the world, in other jurisdictions, to see what we can adopt here. We are looking at ways to help prevent even more the bullying and harassment behaviour that they are subject to online." Gonzalez-Montero says there is a review of Parliament's wider security system on the horizon, which will include both physical and cybersecurity, to identify blind spots and potential improvements. * RNZ's The House, with insights into Parliament, legislation and issues, is made with funding from Parliament's Office of the Clerk.
NZ Herald
16-07-2025
- Business
- NZ Herald
Letters: Dirt bike hoons need to face consequences
Lorraine Kidd, Warkworth. Compo conundrum An article about suggestions of compensation for store owners who had installed ATMs that were capable of cryptocurrency dealing (July 15) quoted Labour MP Duncan Webb as saying: 'I'm gobsmacked that in a cost-of-living crisis they are considering compensating crypto traders.' This is another classic example of an unconsidered knee-jerk reaction to the Regulatory Standards Bill. It's not the crypto traders that the compensation is being considered for. It's small dairy or petrol station owners who have forked out extra money to buy cryptocurrency-enabled ATMs to offer better service to their customers. Should they have foreseen the use of their machines by criminals and therefore the need for a law change? Are they guilty of crypto trading (which in itself is not illegal) by association? Compensation should at least be considered. Chris Chrystall, Epsom. Leaders need to act The obliteration of Gaza tests our willingness to be complicit. At what point will our elected leaders say, 'Stop!' – and take action? Ordinary civilian life has been smashed. Hospitals, houses, schools: deliberately targeted. Journalists, medical staff, aid workers: deliberately killed. The civilian population: bombed out, ordered to flee, and then to flee again. Then starved. Then gunned down when desperately seeking food. Please, would our Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs stand up. Anne Priestley, Remuera. Up in the air There has been comment in various columns recently about the greenhouse gas emissions by the airline industry. It is informative to go to a real-time tracking system that shows the position of every aircraft presently in the air. The only exceptions are military aircraft that wish to remain anonymous. At any one time, there are thousands of aircraft in flight. All those aeroplanes delivering all those passengers and freight every day of the year produce just 2.8% of world greenhouse emissions. Even a massive decrease in flight miles would, therefore, have precious little effect on global warming. Think about that before you flight-shame someone. David Morris, Hillsborough. Reasons for social damage Perhaps people could review their thoughts on Dame Jacinda Ardern's alleged 'social and economic damage' during her tenure as our Prime Minister, versus the current coalition's. Ardern wasn't responsible for social damage, Covid was. Any less stringent an approach to trying to keep it at bay would have been disastrous. As for the economic damage, this Government has borrowed more, defunded more, reduced access to healthcare, affordable housing, education and employment. These count more as 'social damage' as they have been introduced under no valid circumstances that demand them. Blaming the previous Government for anything social or economic, after nearly two years of the current Government being in power, no longer carries any weight or truth. Jeremy Coleman, Hillpark. Power for the people For some time now, there has been much discussion about the integrity and cost of our power network in New Zealand. It is a matter of concern that power prices continue to rise with no action of consequence from successive Governments. In fact, our power system has been affected by retrograde action. Our gas generation is about to dry up. Our coal mining has all but ceased, with expensive imports of coal from overseas, and no further geothermal or hydro stations are planned. What I do not understand is why our Governments do not seem to have strongly supported the domestic installation of solar panels, which is standard in so many other countries, including Australia and in Europe. Even wind farms would make a difference. The message we get is that privatisation of part of our basic infrastructure was a mistake. Is it too much to ask that our major parties agree on an appropriate way forward to secure the future of our power generation that is affordable to all? Bruce Owen, Drury.
