Rotorua MP Todd McClay has pulled an online poll from his website after anonymous voters tried to skew the results.
Mr McClay had been running the poll in a bid to get public opinion on the Alcohol Reform Bill. The poll asked people to vote on what they thought the alcohol purchase age should be.
In addition to the online poll, he has been running surveys in newspapers and has been asking people to email him with their opinions.
The Alcohol Reform Bill will require a vote of conscience from all MPs of the alcohol purchase age. There are three options available: to leave the purchase age at 18, to raise it to 20 or to create a split purchase age of 18 for on-licence premises, such as bars, restaurants and sports clubs, and 20 for off-licences, such as supermarkets and liquor stores.
Mr McClay said he had a "fantastic response" from people via email and through the surveys, but he was disappointed the results of the poll were skewed.
Before the poll was taken down votes for keeping the alcohol purchase at 18 had reached more than 3300, while changing it to 20 had about 80 votes and having a split purchase age had about 40 votes.
He said voting on the poll jumped from about 100 votes to 4000 in the space of about 24 hours. He said the source of the votes couldn't be traced but said technicians suggested the source was either a robot or a programme which had been written to continuously vote on one option.
"It is a bit disappointing that someone has chosen to do this," he said. "Unfortunately we won't be relying on the results from the poll."
Mr McClay said he had received feedback from hundreds of other people in the electorate about the alcohol purchase age.
"So far the majority of people have suggested that they want the purchase age to change," he said. "I still want to have consultation with people in the electorate to see what would be best."
He said he would hold public meetings in either August or September to gauge the opinion of members of his electorate.
In a recent New Zealand Herald DigiPoll survey, more than half of those polled supported a purchasing age of 20 for all types of licensed premises and a further 25 per cent supported raising the age for liquor stores and supermarkets but keeping it at 18 for bars and restaurants.
Just 19.4 per cent wanted the age kept at 18 for both on-licences (bars and restaurants) and off-licences (supermarkets and bottle stores).
The DigiPoll survey found a majority of New Zealanders opposed the introduction of a minimum price for alcohol.