Bryce Edwards has a good summary of an Electoral Commission report: 10 ways to improve our elections

Last week the Electoral Commission released its report on the 2017 general election. It contained useful information about voting last year but, more importantly, it made a number of important recommendations to Parliament about improving New Zealand elections.

Recommendation 1: Fix MMP by dealing with earlier recommendations

The most important recommendation to come out of the report is for Parliament to again consider the 2012 Review of MMP. This report came up with some significant improvements, but was buried by the then-National government, which claimed there was not adequate consensus in Parliament to implement the changes.

It remains a disgrace that the 2012 review was ignored by self-interested politicians.

Notably, this 2012 report suggested that the MMP threshold of 5% should be lowered, because it had proved to be too high, in terms of being a barrier to new political parties gaining election to Parliament. To back up this point, the Commission’s recent report includes a table of information about the declining number of parties representing in Parliament.

With both NZ First and Greens just bettering the threshold in the 2017 election and at real risk of dropping below it next election there is a real risk that the number of parties will drop even further, with little chance of a new party getting into Parliament.

The 5% threshold is a failure for representative democracy and should be reduced at least to 3%, if not lower. It has been retained to protect large parties and is anti-democratic.

Recommendation 2: Update the prohibition on electioneering on election day and during the advance voting period

The Commission says the current election day rules, which essentially prohibit electioneering, are inconsistent with the rules in place during the advance voting period. This means there are only very limited rules for the couple of weeks prior to election day – when about half of votes are now made – but suddenly things become extremely restrictive on the actual final day of voting.

The current election day only rules have become a nonsense.

Recommendation 3: Fix the election broadcast allocations and prohibitions

This is especially a problem in terms of the money allocated each election to the parties, which they can spend on television, radio, and now also internet advertising. Last year the Commission allocated $4.1m to parties, but notes the ongoing complaints about lack of fairness in these allocations, drawing particular attention to smaller parties who claim to be disadvantaged by the unequal distributions of monies.

The Commission recommends a review. But these issues fall into both the “too hard” and “self-interest” baskets of the current parliamentary parties who benefit from the broken system.

The major beneficiaries of a badly flawed system should not be the ones who decide on a system that favours them.

Recommendation 4: Update rules about the misuse of electoral roll data

All sorts of companies, such as debt collectors and marketers make use of the printed electoral roll in order to carry out their commercial activities. There are huge privacy issues involved, which the law appears to be ignorant of, and there are people who therefore choose not to enroll to vote precisely because they don’t want their residential addresses to be made public.

The risk is made worse by the fact that the political parties are provided with the electoral roll in electronic form. This is a provision designed by the politicians so that their parties can more effectively send election advertising to voters and so forth. It’s questionable whether the parties should be given this data, and it seems that it’s an accident waiting to happen, as there are no procedures or guarantees that any of the 16 registered political parties will prevent this personal data falling into the wrong hands.

Recommendation 5: Allow Māori voters to change rolls at any time

Māori voters should be able to switch between the general and Māori electoral roll at any time according to the Commission. Currently, people of Māori descent can only change during the Māori Electoral Option period, every five-six years.

It seems odd that roll switching can only happen at specific times each 5-6 years.

Recommendation 6: Electoral offences system needs updating

When someone is deemed to have breached election rules, the Electoral Commission’s only remedy for this is essentially to refer the case to the Police for prosecution.

A substantial review of these laws is called for by the Commission. And although the politicians would surely welcome a chance to fix up some of the problematic rules they have to deal with, this area is a minefield of difficulty which could cause all sorts of prolonged debate about how to ensure elections are properly run without undue influence.

And the Police usually do nothing, or if they do something it takes so long it is ineffective.

Recommendation 7: Ban rosette wearing in polling places

Following last year’s election there were 342 complaints to the Commission about political party scrutineers wearing their party lapel badges or rosettes at the polling booths. Currently this is legal, but there seems to be an expectation that all voting places should be “campaign-free”, and therefore the Commission recommends a ban.

Seems trivial, but “campaign-free” polling places seems reasonable.

Recommendation 8: Allow voters to enroll on election day

Currently, voters can enrol to vote right up until election day. They can even enrol to vote at the same time that they make an advance vote in the two weeks leading up to election day. And of course, there are always a number of unenrolled voters who attempt to vote on election day, and have to cast a “special vote”, but have these disallowed. In 2017, 19,000 people had their votes disallowed. But the Commission suggests they should be allowed to enrol voters on election day.

A no-brainer – the current election day ban on enrolment is dated and ridiculous.

Recommendation 9: Introduce a fixed date for elections

The current rules for setting the triennial general election date are deliberately loose, allowing incumbent governments the choice of when to go to the polls. The Commission raises the prospect of changing the law to provide for a fixed election date – they suggest some discussion about this. They say that this would provide more certainty for voters, campaigners and candidates.

Is this fixing a problem that isn’t really broken? Some flexibility and pragmatism about election dates can’t be a problem.

Recommendation 10: Update where voting booths can be sited

The locations were people can cast their vote should be modernised according to the Commission. Currently there are a number of prohibitions relating to the sale and consumption of alcohol, which was historically meant to prevent voting in pubs where undue influence might occur. But now the Commission wants to set up booths where voters regularly gather, such as supermarkets and shopping malls.

In fact, in 2017 the Commission was remarkably successful in setting up advance voting booths in such places. But for election day, the rules are stricter, which meant that the booths had to be removed.

Bizarre. You can buy a bottle of wine or beer at a supermarket and then vote before election day but not on election day.

Finally, there are plenty of other recommendations of various levels of importance in the report.

The full Electoral Commission report.