In a breakthrough for those pushing for voting reform, a Government review signals it will recommend changes to encourage more representative and far-sighted decision making
Sixteen-year-old Cate Tipler catches the bus to and from Selwyn College. Mostly the school buses are reliable, but other public transport in Auckland can be a problem. Often public buses turn up late, or not at all.
"I know there’s a bus driver shortage due to difficult working conditions which contributes to this. Sixteen and 17-year-olds are huge users of public transport and if we could vote then we could have our say on how we could best improve our public transport infrastructure."
As co-director of the Make It 16 campaign, Tipler argues the voting age should be lowered from 18: that would have an impact on government and council decisions that most affect young people, such as the availability of good public transport, or addressing climate emissions.
Now, a Government review has reached the same conclusion.
The Review into the Future for Local Government says it will publish draft recommendations to strengthen local democracy, to see communities play a more active role in decisions through the use of deliberative and representative democracy processes. Lowering the voting age to 16 and longer council terms are likely to be among those recommendations, the review team says.
Former Auckland deputy mayor Penny Hulse is on the review panel. "Civics education is needed to help people understand the relevance of local government, and to also see the possibilities that it offers in building strong communities," she said in a speech to the Local Government NZ conference in Palmerston North.
"To genuinely engage our communities, the voting age should be lowered to 16, and terms of elected members being extended beyond three years," she said.
"Young people are learning more about things that matter, and what we can do as communities, and what they can do themselves. There is absolutely no reason why they should be prevented from voting." – Lianne Dalziel, Christchurch Mayor
To increase trust and confidence in the democratic system, local elections should be managed and administered nationally, rather than councils determining their own voting mechanisms.
As well as youth and diversity, Hulse also emphasised the importance of experience on councils. "We need leaders and connectors with lived experience who know how to bring communities together and who are confident enough to make sound long-term decisions," she said.
"There should be comprehensive mandatory professional development, with better support for elected members. This is not just about governance training but upskilling in all areas including cultural competence, community development, civic innovation, and connection to international best practice.
"Elected members also need to be adequately remunerated, have decent and supportive work environments and access to support programmes."
The review panel had proposed to deliver its draft recommendations next month, in time to influence voting in October's local elections. But at the urging of Local Government NZ, the Government has extended the deadline for the draft report until after the elections – which may have influenced the decision by review chair Jim Palmer to disclose some of the draft recommendations in advance.
This week, Local Government Minister Nanaia Mahuta acknowledged Palmer and Hulse had pointed to issues such as lowering the voting age, but a spokesperson said she wouldn't be responding until after she received the draft report in October.
"Lowering it to 16 would mean that as 15-year-olds, they start to learn about elections. While they're all together. They get to register to vote while they're at school altogether. And then probably it will then go on to vote for the rest of their lives." – Golriz Ghahraman, Green MP
The deadlines for both the draft and final reports had been extended after requests from the independent panel and from Local Government NZ, she said, because of a range of reasons including staff illnesses and continuity issues in the writing of the reports, and the need to allow more time for submissions on the draft report once it is released.
Green MP Golriz Ghahraman has a Member's bill before Parliament to lower the voting age to 16. The Supreme Court is considering whether it will declare the current law to be inconsistent with the Bill of Rights by disenfranchising 16 and 17-year-olds, and now the change is being backed by mayors such as Masterton's Lyn Patterson and Napier's Kirsten Wise in an open letter to MPs.
In Christchurch, retiring mayor Lianne Dalziel says she recently visited the rebuilt Te Aratai College in Linwood. "Honestly, if you ever come down to Christchurch, I recommend you go," she says. "Linwood was almost downtrodden, but now it's amazing, it's virtually doubled in size in two years. The 16 and 17-year-olds sitting in the room asked more probing, intelligent questions than a number of people in older age groups.
"Young people are learning more about things that matter, and what we can do as communities, and what they can do themselves. And I thought, there is absolutely no reason why they should be prevented from voting."
Dunedin's Aaron Hawkins says the decisions councils make have a disproportionate impact on younger residents. "They deserve to have a say in how they're being represented," he tells Newsroom. "Some of the most informed and invested people I've met locally are still too young to vote."
But the responses to extending the council term beyond three years (implicitly, to four years) has met a more mixed response.
"No one below the age of 35 votes in any great numbers, because there's a great correlation between paying rates and being interested in local politics," he says. "And most young people are renting, or freeloading at home off their parents." – local government expert
"I'm something of an outlier in that I don't think our terms should be extended to four years," Hawkins says. "I think the 'short election cycle' is too often used as a cop-out for not getting things done, and have seen no evidence that a longer term will magically cure anything.
Both Dalziel and Hawkins agreed the Parliamentary and local government terms and voting rules should be reformed at the same time; having different electoral rolls and stints in office would create problems.
"Mostly my concern is with the wider political context," Hawkins says. "I don't think we could extend the term for local elections without also extending the parliamentary term to four years, otherwise we'd end up out of sync.
"We have one of the most powerful Parliamentary executives in the Westminster system, with no upper house to temper the House of Representatives. All a longer term would do is dilute our democracy."
Ghahraman's bill would lower the voting age in Parliamentary elections, but she says she'd also be open to change in local elections first, providing a template for Parliament. "We're missing out on the opportunity to have young people register and vote while they're at school," she says.
"So lowering it to 16 would mean that as 15-year-olds, they start to learn about elections. While they're all together. They get to register to vote while they're at school altogether. And then probably it will then go on to vote for the rest of their lives."
On what sorts of issues does she see it making a difference? "We'd have much higher engagement and so a much higher level of political party engagement with youth issues. There are issues that we're missing altogether, and there are voters that we're missing altogether. Marijuana legalisation and sensible drug policy might be issues I would point to."
That begs the question: is extending the franchise to younger voters more likely to advantage parties on the left?
"If the motivation for extending people's rights is political, I'm fine with that," says Ghahraman. "I'm really for it! But to say that right-wing politicians have deliberately disenfranchised people who might not vote for them is the real callous move. Having said that, the biggest political party on campus at Auckland Uni, where I went to school, is now the Young Nats."
Not everyone agrees. One local government expert says the real challenge is not to allow young people to vote, but to persuade them to vote.
"No one below the age of 35 votes in any great numbers, because there's a great correlation between paying rates and being interested in local politics," he says. "And most young people are renting, or freeloading at home off their parents."
Dr Bronwyn Wood, a senior lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington's School of Education, is researching young people and citizenship. She says Austria lowered the voting age to 16 in 2008, accompanied by a suite of awareness and educational package.
There is some evidence from Austria that first time voting choice is more polarised and less centric. And there appears to be a first time voting boost for 16 and 17-year-olds that doesn't translate to 18 to 21-year-olds.
"One of the strongest arguments I have for why youth should vote is that they inherit the policies and their consequences formed by adults for a much longer time than the adults themselves. So Brexit was strongly opposed by the younger generation but the older generation got what they wanted – which seems quite unfair.
On the other hand, though, she says youth are poorly set up to understand the nuances of political party positions at 16. "Arguably many adults still don't understand these either – but in the meantime many youth don't want, or feel confident, to vote at 16. Any campaign to lower voting age therefore needs to have a package of educational support."
