National’s “harder-to-vote” Electoral Bill

Mike Smith
10 years ago
Categories: same old national

There’s another sign National is getting a bit desperate at the beginning of election year 2014, as they reach in to the Tory trick-bag of voter suppression in the revised Electoral Amendment Bill reported back to the House on 18 December 2013.

The Select Committee’s report after their review of the 2011 election accepted the advice of the independent Electoral Commission and recommended expanding the use of the easy-vote card. As the Committee report said,

it would speed up, simplify, and improve the accuracy of the currently manual processes of issuing ballot papers and recording votes on election day, and compiling the master roll during the scrutiny process. It has the potential to reduce the number of special votes needed (by up to 52,000 on 2011 statistics) by allowing voters who enrol after writ day and vote in their electorate to use an EasyVote card and cast an ordinary vote, instead of having to complete a declaration and cast a special vote. Using EasyVote cards to issue ballot papers would also help ensure that the correct ballot papers were issued to each voter.

This proposal found its way into the Electoral Amendment Bill submitted to the House in August 2013. Speaking at its introduction, Justice Minister Judith Collins said:

Another important change enabled by this bill is the greater use of EasyVote cards during the voting process. EasyVote cards are currently used to assist election day workers find voters’ page and line numbers in the electoral roll. This bill will enable EasyVote cards to be used as a record that an ordinary vote has been cast. It will also allow the cards to be used instead of a declaration form for special voters. This new use of EasyVote cards will simplify and speed up the issuing of ordinary and special votes. It will also make the scrutinising of the rolls that occurs during the election counting process more accurate and efficient.

The Bill reported back in December 2013 after Parliament had risen for the year deleted the EasyVote provisions, and added a requirement that all voters speak or affirm their name added. What we now have might be called National’s “harder-to-vote” provisions.

There was one other change in December – a return to the previous practice of allowing party canvassers to display ribbons and rosettes on the streets on election day. Speaking to the provision removing this in the original Bill, Committee Chair Scott Simpson made what can only be described as a thoroughly racist comment:

We will be able to ensure that the good people of South Auckland are not having busloads of KFC – bearing Labour Party supporters wearing ribbons and rosettes descending upon them and escorting them to the election booth.

Embarrassment pure and simple may have changed Committee Chair Simpson’s mind between August and December; he would not want this remark being played back to him in the election year debate.

Of course there were some other political changes between August and December that may have changed Judith Collins’ mind on easy voting. I have no doubt that the good people of South Auckland are still the target of the harder-to-vote provisions of the reported back Bill.

As a scrutineer in past elections before the introduction of easy-vote cards I have watched as Returning Officers were unable to find registered voters on the roll when they did give their name, usually because of a different order of surname and forename. The new provisions will make things harder for Returning Officers, and we can also expect to see a more aggressive approach from National Party scrutineers, watching to challenge voters by demanding statutory declarations.

The Select Committee report on the 2011 election also stated that:

Our electoral system is based on a high-trust model, which means we need to ensure the integrity of the system as our society grows and changes.

The problem is that the National Party does not trust the voters of South Auckland to vote the right way. Better to make it harder and discourage them from voting at all.