PM Chris Hipkins rules out referendum before election on electoral system review recommendations

Prime Minister Chris Hipkins is ruling out holding a referendum prior to this year’s election following the recommendations of a panel that reviewed New Zealand’s electoral system.

The working group recommended holding a referendum on extending the parliamentary term from three to four years, capping donations at $30,000 per party per electoral cycle, and lowering the 5 per cent threshold to 3.5 per cent while abolishing the one-seat threshold.

It also recommended lowering the voting age to 16 and extending voting rights to all prisoners.

Hipkins said while most politicians would prefer a four-year term, there were no plans to hold a referendum this year.

“I haven’t been looking at any plans to put a referendum before the public.

“Ultimately, we’ll be clear on that before the election, but a referendum would not happen in conjunction with this year’s general election.”

Prime Minister Chris Hipkins doesn't think a referendum will be held ahead of the election. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Other recommendations, namely lowering the voting age, would require support from 75 per cent of MPs - known as a super majority.

On capping donations, Hipkins said the existing system encouraged transparency and he feared introducing a cap could lead to people finding ways around the rules, such as donating under different titles.

National leader Christopher Luxon believed talking about changes to the electoral system was the “wrong conversation” to have currently.

“I’m just very conscious outside of this place, New Zealand people are doing it incredibly tough and the focus needs to be on the cost of living, it needs to be on education, it needs to be on health, it needs to be on crime.”

He clarified that the party didn’t support any of the recommendations, except for increasing the parliamentary term.

National police spokesman Mark Mitchell was particularly opposed to extending voting rights to prisoners sentenced to more than three years in jail.

“I think that you lose some rights when you offend against the community that you live in, you choose not to [live] by the rules and so you lose a few rights and one of those is actually the right to vote.”

Act leader David Seymour opposed the recommendations and questioned the group’s authority.

“Who on earth are the people on this panel? No one voted for them. Why should they get to decide what our political system is?”

The Opportunities Party leader Raf Manji welcomed the recommendation to lower the MMP threshold to 3.5 per cent, saying the current setting was “simply undemocratic.

“Our electoral system undermines the sacred principle that every vote counts - and at the last election 7.9 per cent of voters were not represented in Parliament because they voted for parties who did not make the threshold. That must change.”

According to the latest 1News Kantar Public poll, TOP was polling at 1 per cent.

The Opportunities Party leader Raf Manji. Photo / Supplied

The Independent Electoral Review Panel was set up after the 2020 election campaign unexpectedly veered into discussing matters like extending the parliamentary term to four years. The panel was appointed in 2022 and these are its draft recommendations, with final recommendations due in November.

After 58 public meetings and more than 1700 submissions it is now reporting a swathe of draft recommendations to make electoral laws “fairer, clearer and more accessible”.

Chair Deborah Hart said the review was an opportunity for more wholesale changes to electoral reform than had been attempted in the past.

“There have been piecemeal changes to electoral law over many years, including some recently, but this review is an opportunity to step back and look at the bigger picture. While many parts of Aotearoa New Zealand’s electoral system work well, we found it can be improved.”

Whoever is in government when the final report is delivered in November will be able to act on some of the recommendations. Others, like lowering the voting age, require a 75 per cent majority in Parliament, which means they are unlikely to be taken up unless they command widespread support from voters during the election campaign.

The main recommendations include restricting political donations to only registered voters, rather than organisations.

Donations would be capped at $30,000 per electoral cycle to each party and its candidates per cycle. This allows people to donate to multiple different parties and candidates, but each party and candidates for that party can only receive $30,000 per donor, per cycle.

Some individual donors give well in excess of $30,000 every three years. New Zealand’s richest man Graeme Hart gave $250,000 to National last year and $100,000 to Act last year and this year. Labour and the Greens are also beneficiaries of large donations, although they receive far lower amounts. Fitness magnate Phillip Mills had donated $50,000 each to Labour and the Greens this year, on top of $50,000 to Labour last year.

The group recommended lowering the voting age for general elections to 16 - something most Labour MPs support although the current Labour leadership has said it will not be introducing legislation to lower the voting age in general elections.

This is a change from former Labour leader Jacinda Ardern who said she would introduce legislation that lowered the voting age in general elections to 16.

The voting age is an entrenched provision of the Electoral Act, meaning any move to change it would require a successful referendum or the support of 75 per cent of Parliament, which it does not currently have - and is unlikely to have following the election.

The group recommended extending voting rights to all prisoners. Last term, the Government restored voting rights to prisoners who had been sentenced to less than three years in prison, but prisoners sentenced for longer are still not able to vote.

The group recommended a referendum on extending the parliamentary term to four years. During the 2020 election campaign, both then-National leader Judith Collins and then-Labour leader Jacinda Ardern said they backed a move.

Governments often complain the three-year term is too short to complete an agenda, and the focus too quickly shifts from governing in the first and second years to campaigning in the third.

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Lowering the 5 per cent threshold to 3.5 per cent could allow more parties to enter Parliament and abolish the coat-tailing rule.

Very few parties have managed to cross the 3.5 per cent threshold and not enter Parliament some other way. In 2014, the Conservatives polled 3.9 per cent, and in 2008, NZ First polled 4.03 per cent, missing out on a seat in Parliament.

Parties like TOP could benefit from this change as it is often believed voters avoid minor parties who might not make it into Parliament because they fear “wasting” their vote.

Te Pāti Māori could lose out if the coat-tailing rule is abolished, as it would need to cross the 3.5 per cent threshold or win electorates to maintain the scale of its representation in Parliament. It currently holds only one electorate, although it regularly polls close to 3.5 per cent.

The group said the Electoral Act should be amended to uphold the Te Tiriti o Waitangi and its principles, and establish Māori governance over electoral data collected about Māori.

It also recommended removing restrictions around when Māori can switch electoral rolls. The Māori electoral option was liberalised this parliamentary term, but some restrictions remain, including switching roles in the three months before a general or local election, and before a parliamentary byelection if the change would move the person into the electorate where the byelection was being held.

The group also recommended rewriting the Electoral Act to make it “modern, comprehensive, and accessible”.

Consultation is now open on the draft recommendations.

“In developing our recommendations, we had to balance a range of views and priorities. As we did this, we were guided by our core principles including fairness and encouraging participation,” Hart said.

“We now want to test our thinking and hear what New Zealanders think.”

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