This term National passed legislation preventing people from enrolling to vote in the two weeks up to election day. Previously people could enrol on the day they voted, and in 2023 100,000 people enrolled on election day.
One of the implications is the defacto disenfranchisement of young people. The Spinoff two weeks ago,
On October 25, the door slams shut on enrolments for the 2026 election. And with a fortnight to go to that deadline, one age group is substantially under-represented. More than a third of 18- to 24-year-olds who are eligible to vote are not currently registered, according to the latest figures from the Electoral Commission.
“It could be a bit of a looming disaster,” said electoral law expert Andrew Geddis, speaking to the Spinoff for an episode of At Large with Toby Manhire.
“Even if we get it up to 75% of people 18 to 24, that is still going to be about 20% below the enrolment rate of all the other age cohorts,” he said. “And so, if you only have 75% of people aged 18 to 24 enrolled by October the 25th, that means a quarter of young people in New Zealand will not legally be able to vote. They will disappear out of our electoral system. They’ll disappear out of choosing the next government.”
In addition to the impact on younger people, older people are more likely to vote on the right, this skews the election. Such self-serving voter suppression, but a government voted into power, is absolutely shameful.
The rationale from Luxon was that it would get a government in place sooner, because it sped up the counting process. How much faster? Chewie from BHN phoned and found out it would reduce the time by two days. So that’s tens or hundreds of thousands of people not enrolled to save two days.
Chris Hipkins says in the same clip that Labour will reverse the law change.
So yeah, what Frank says. National should be asked every day for the next twelve days, why can’t people enrol to vote?
There is no justification for this. The time saved in obtaining the election result is negligible or non-existent. And importantly, even if the time saved was as large as the government initially implied, it would still not be justified, because the responsibility of democratic government is to maximise voter turnout. Any person, party or institution that does not want to maximise turnout is definitionally anti-democratic.
Now that this self-evident fact is widely recognised, we are getting a second layer of bogus justifications added on top. The substance of these justifications, which vary in their forms of presentation, is basically this: people who can't get their act together to enrol on time are too stupid, lazy or disorganised to deserve a vote, even though they are legally entitled to vote by the rules relating to qualifying age and residency. It is an implicit judgment on their moral fitness to vote based on entirely arbitrary characteristics. A different Government could choose different arbitrary characteristics, such as being too old, fat, short, white or rich.
The Government is not stupid. It knows that these various justifications are laughable, but they don't care and will keep repeating them. They know there is a puritanical streak in many conservative voters who share their views. It is likely that if this Government is returned, they will be so emboldened that they will double down and try to further suppress participation among their opponents. It is training-wheels fascism, and if they are rewarded for it, things will get worse.
It's disgusting!
What is the difference between Luxon and Donald Trump? Nothing. They both have proven they are anti-democracy and favour dictatorships.
Is he saying that because there will be less people voting, the count will be quicker? There is the legislated period (two weeks I think it is) to enable overseas votes to arrive and be counted which means his rationale is total bullshit.
In short the election has been rigged. That is grounds for legal action by his political opponents in my opinion.