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Speaker 1: Local Government New Zealand wants polling stations and ballot boxes

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Speaker 1: for local elections, get rid of the postal voting they

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Speaker 1: reckon Nick Smith's with Local Government New Zealand, the Electoral

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Speaker 1: Reform chair, good evening.

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Speaker 2: Nick A, good to be on your program right.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for being here. So is what people not turning

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Speaker 1: up to vote? We know that's a problem. Do you

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Speaker 1: think this will change that?

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Speaker 2: Yes? I do, and I think we've got two big problems.

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Speaker 2: The first is for thirty years we've seen a decline

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Speaker 2: in the participation in our local elections. When I first

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Speaker 2: stood in the nineteen eighties, we're up at about sixty percent.

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Speaker 2: We're down to forty percent. That compares with eighty percent

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Speaker 2: of people voting in our parliamentary elections. And then the

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Speaker 2: other clinger is that post is in a death spiral.

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Speaker 2: The numbers of letters has declined by about ninety percent.

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Speaker 2: There's lots of people that even don't have a letterbox

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Speaker 2: or certainly don't check one, and that is negatively impacting

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Speaker 2: on people being part of our local elections. And the

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Speaker 2: real problem with it, Ryan is for mayors or councils

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Speaker 2: to be able to speak for their communities when you've

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Speaker 2: now got well less than half the people voting, it's

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Speaker 2: a real risk and if we really believe in our democracy,

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Speaker 2: we need to sort it.

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Speaker 1: I agree with you because I just think about my

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Speaker 1: own situation. If I had a letter, you know, thing

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Speaker 1: I've got to fill in, and then I've got to

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Speaker 1: remember to take it with me into the car, put

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Speaker 1: it in a bag, then remember to get it out

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Speaker 1: and go to a post bar. I've never been to

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Speaker 1: a post box, you know, in the last ten years.

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Speaker 1: I mean, if there was somewhere I could go and

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Speaker 1: tick my box, it would be a lot easier.

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Speaker 2: And the other part is we know the parliamentary election

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Speaker 2: system works. And one of the advantages of having the

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Speaker 2: Electoral Commission run it is they run it on a

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Speaker 2: nationwide basis. We know the habit and we've got a

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Speaker 2: level of participation. It's actually one of the highest in

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Speaker 2: the world. Now, the other part advantages I've got is

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Speaker 2: we all remember the Orange man and his dog that

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Speaker 2: encourage us to get out to vote. They spend about

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Speaker 2: four bucks a voter on that campaign. In comparison, councils

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Speaker 2: each run their own sort of little ad hot campaign,

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Speaker 2: averagely spending about a ninth of that, and you do

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Speaker 2: get what you pay for. And so I'm keen to

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Speaker 2: recruit the Orange man and the dog and getting him

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Speaker 2: doing his job when we do our council elections.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and when the better is better than forty percent,

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Speaker 1: which is the current turn out which is not great. Next,

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Speaker 1: thank you for that, Nick Smith, who is with the

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Speaker 1: Electoral Reform Chair at Local Government New Zealand. For more

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Speaker 1: from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news Talks.

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Speaker 1: It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 1: on iHeartRadio