Voters slow to have their say

The stats are out and things are not looking good for voter participation this council election season.

At this stage of voting for the last Hutt City Council election held three years ago, 10.68 per cent of ballot papers sent out had been returned.

But as of September 23 this year, at the same point in the voting cycle, only 6.82 per cent of papers had been received by electionz.com, the company which counts the council’s votes. Voting in Upper Hutt has also been slow.

Hutt City Council parks and gardens manager Bruce Hodgins becomes Lower Hutt’s electoral officer during local body election season. He has been involved in 11 elections and has seen a strong downwards trend in voter participation.

Hodgins said the number of votes received late last week was down on previous years and was ‘‘lower than we would have expected’’.

A few factors aside from voter disinterest could have affected that, though, he said.

Voting papers were now being processed by electionz.com in Christchurch instead of Petone, so it may take longer for the ballot papers to get to the counting facility than previously.

The weather had been atrocious when many ballot papers were delivered on September 16 and 17.

Some voting papers would have become sodden in the process and if they were damaged to the point where they couldn’t just be dried out, people could lodge a special vote, Hodgins said.

It was important people voted as councils and district health boards had a huge impact on their lives.

‘‘Council will be spending over $600 million in the next triennium. It’s important that people understand that council makes decisions in respect of how that money is spent.’’

Hodgins said there were two campaigns underway to try and increase voter turnout, one organised nationally by Local Government NZ.

The other was run between Greater Wellington Regional Council, Wellington City Council and Hutt City Council.

Its message was ‘‘love your city’’, encouraging residents to show they cared by voting.