Voter turnout is well down on the 2020 election so far. Photo / Michael Craig
Voter turnout is well down on the 2020 election so far. Photo / Michael Craig
A “big plunge” in early voting reflects a negative campaign that failed to inspire voters and caused some to turn away from politics “in disgust”, a political analyst says.
By the end of Wednesday, with three voting days to go, nearly 1 million people had cast a ballot, compared to more than 1.5 million at the same stage of the 2020 general election, Electoral Commission data showed.
That was up from Tuesday, when just over 843,000 people had voted, compared to 1.4 million people at the same point in 2020.
Political commentator and analyst Dr Bryce Edwards, speaking after the Tuesday tallies, said it was “optimistic” to hope the “big plunge” in 2023 indicated lots of voters were waiting for the end of the campaign to vote.
“More likely, it just shows that few voters are going to turn out this time around.”
Edwards, director of the Democracy Project at Victoria University, said plenty of signs suggested the public had “turned off” from this election and surveys showed people were not “very enamoured” by the main contenders for prime minister.
“Generally, political parties and politicians are failing to inspire voters.”
Edwards said he believed they had not put forward programmes or solutions to the big problems facing New Zealand that were convincing or enthused the public.
“Furthermore, there’s a rather negative tone to the whole campaign.
“The rise of battles over ethnicity and race in particular has probably turned a lot of people off politics.”
He said he believed people, especially young people, were “turning away from politics in disgust”.
He said the responsibility for mobilising the masses to get out and vote lay with politicians.
Political commentator and analyst Dr Bryce Edwards, who is director of the Democracy Project at Victoria University.
“High voter turnout normally occurs when the public perceives there is a close race and their vote would make a difference and also if they perceived electoral options were significantly different.”
He said neither of those things were true this year.
“If this year’s voter turnout is the lowest in New Zealand’s electoral history — and looks like it probably will be — then this will simply reflect the fact that this election is the most hollow and unsatisfactory in living memory.”
Edwards said voter turnout should be rising fast as the barriers to voting were now "very low”.
“It’s never been so easy with voting booths in more accessible places such as shopping malls and supermarkets and encouragements to vote early were particularly loud and frequent.”
Electoral Commission chief electoral officer Karl Le Quesne said the tally was ahead of the vote count for the same stage in the 2017 election.
More than 3.8 million people nationwide were estimated to be eligible to enrol to vote and Le Quesne told NZME on Thursday the commission expected a “steady increase” in votes in the lead-up to election day.
“There is plenty of opportunity for anyone who hasn’t voted yet to do so,” he said in a media release today.
“It’s important that you have your say on who represents you in Parliament for the next three years. Saturday is your final chance to enrol, vote and be heard.”
Across the Tauranga, Bay of Plenty, Rotorua, Taupō, and Coromandel electorates, an estimated more than 39,100 eligible voters had yet to enrol as of October 1.
The commission could not provide a breakdown of advance voting figures for each electorate before election day.
Voting on Election Day
More than 2300 voting places will be open from 9am to 7pm across the country.
Find one at https://vote.nz/ or check the EasyVote pack, otherwise phone 0800 36 76 56.
Taking an EasyVote card will make voting faster, but people can vote without one
Anyone not enrolled to vote can enrol at any voting place at the same time as they vote.
Sandra Conchie is a senior journalist at the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post who has been a journalist for 24 years. She mainly covers police, court and other justice stories, as well as general news. She has been a Canon Media Awards regional/community reporter of the year.
