Why local body election hoardings need to change - Editorial

The hoardings for local body elections pop up in spring every three years. Photo / File

THE FACTS

• Local body advertising hoardings are put up in the lead-up to the local body elections.
• New Zealand has postal voting only.
• Voting papers are sent out between September 9 and September 22. Voting closes at midday on election day, October 11.

‘Tis the season of visual cliché.

Triennial local body election hoardings proliferate in spring, alongside the daffodils.

One of those things is certainly not like the other, and by cliche, we’re talking the one with the smiley face made of batten and plastic.

The upside (and potentially only one) to the roadside political platitude is that it reminds us it’s election time.

And that is important.

One could also argue that while they present as Flintstonian, their physical presence is commensurate with the equally Flintstonian fact that we have postal voting only.

Both seem to be on the wrong side of history.

Voting papers are sent out between September 9 and September 22. Voting closes at midday on election day, October 11.

Maybe once online voting is introduced, it’ll render election signs obsolete.

Essentially, hoardings are the moth-eaten cousin of the outdated soapbox – only with the candidate absent from the conversation.

It’s possible the timeless smiles and hearty promises actually increase voter apathy, because it’s tough to think of a worse way to help voters make informed choices – or to lift their enthusiasm.

Very little of a hopeful’s politically relevant qualities can be inferred.

Many slogans can hardly be described as aspirational.

The worst are those who make no statement at all and simply ask people to vote for the candidate.

But here’s where we need to make a concession.

Running for public office is brave; anyone who elects to put their mug on a 3m billboard must realise there is a degree of absurdity – and that they’re offering themselves up for critique.

Kudos for embracing the kitsch.

However, that doesn’t mean people can’t be a little more creative.

Wouldn’t it be something if someone mixed it up? How about a billboard that goes on the attack, something risque, something that pushes a brazen button?

Instead, we’re often subjected to reruns of a bad film we can’t mute.

And let’s not forget the plastic trade-off for our landfills for those signs that end up there.

Here’s an idea.

Maybe Hawke’s Bay’s global designing legend and environmentalist David Trubridge can come up with or suggest a billboard medium that doesn’t hurt our soils.

The Whakatū designer once claimed that people should seek out “cultural nourishment”.

There has never been a better example of malnourishment than our corrugated plastic jungles.

Either way, before next bemoaning voter turnout, maybe some candidates should ask themselves what they are doing to excite them.