August 28, 2008

New Voting System for Waitakere City

Waitakere City Council has voted to introduce the Single Transferable Vote (STV) system for the next local body elections.

Waitakere City will have its next Council chosen under the new system in 2010 unless a poll of electors demands otherwise.

Until now Waitakere City has used the First Past the Post (FPP) system.

STV sees all candidates able to be ranked, in order of preference, by the voter, rather than placing ticks for the candidates selected up to the number of vacancies that exist.

Mayor Bob Harvey says the system will reduce the number of wasted votes and provide for more equitable representation.

The Council and the health boards will now be elected in the same way which will, hopefully, reduce voter confusion. “In recent elections we have used FPP for the Council and on the same voting paper the STV system for our health board,” he says.

“Anecdotal evidence and the number of invalid votes cast suggest that the different systems may have confused people.”

The Council has also decided not to introduce separate Maori wards at the next election. It will however continue to have a member of its Te Taumata Runanga (Maori Standing Committee) appointed to the City’s Policy and Strategy Committee.

Waitakere’s chief electoral officer, Darryl Griffin, says that the proposal to change to STV will now be publicly advertised.

If more than 5% of eligible voters (around 6,400) wish to change that decision then a poll must be called for.

He expects public notification to be made next week.

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