Daily voter turnout data paints a grim picture for local democracy in Auckland, where each election sees fewer and fewer people return to the figurative ballot box
Last local body election in Auckland saw about 375,000 orange envelopes on their way back to council with nicely-filled-out ballot sheets tucked inside of them. That’s just over a third of the number of purple envelopes sent out to all eligible voters.
It’s a proportion that has been the way of things for about a decade, with the amount of people taking the chance to participate in local democracy dancing around a third.
This time around it’s looking like the turnout will be slightly lower than the usual numbers, if the trends continue over the next two days.
It will mean that whether there’s a Wayne Brown or Efeso Collins-led council in the works, it’s likely most Aucklanders won’t have voted for either candidate.
But why is the proportion of purple to orange envelopes so out of whack?
Total voter turnout has dropped over the past decade from an average of 51 percent across Auckland back in 2010 to 35 percent in 2019. The biggest drop was between 2010 and 2013, following the first term of the amalgamated Super City, which saw incumbent Len Brown re-elected.
It suggests the people turned out to have their say in the first showing of the Super City, but since then have reverted back to previous levels of non-participation.
In 2007, turnout for Auckland City Council elections was 40 percent. After the climb up to more than half of eligible voters turning out, it has since hovered around a third.
Wednesday’s data on the current voter turnout in Auckland shows 23 percent of people have voted. That’s 86 percent of the amount of people who had voted at the same point last election, three days out from close of polls.
In the past 10 days, voter turnout has been at an average of 83 percent of that at the same point in the last election and only 61.7 percent of the average turnout up to the equivalent point in 2016.
Make it 16 co-director Sanat Singh said it was an “an abysmal voter turnout rate for one of the world's leading democracies”.
He said the data is clear that low voter turnouts can be turned around by lowering voting age and getting habits entrenched among young people.
“I’m not necessarily surprised we have such a low voter turnout,” he said. “I think that’s just a characteristic of how our local government systems work rather than a symptom. I think it’s wrong to blame the eligible population of voters for not coming out to vote, because the way we frame and communicate local government has simply not translated effectively to voter turnout.”
He pointed to examples like Germany, where some states have lowered the age for voting to 16 in municipal elections, and said bringing in a lower age at a local government level first could be a good step towards bringing it in for general elections.
It would be easier for the government to bring in, only needing a majority rather than the 75 percent supermajority needed to change electoral laws around general elections.
“It’s an idea becoming a lot more normalised and gaining momentum,” he said. “You'd see this behavioural shift around how we treat local elections, young people would understand this is incredibly important without us having to scream it from the top of our lungs.”
He said Auckland’s lower rates could be put down to a more diverse and younger population meaning fewer people understand how to vote or how the system works.
It seems efforts from Auckland Council to increase the engagement of Aucklanders with the democratic process has not closed the gap - although voter turnout could be even lower without recent attempts to make it easier to vote and be informed.
These have included increasing the amount of voter drop-off stations, with boxes at 65 Countdown supermarkets, 11 Auckland Transport hubs, libraries and council service centres. On top of that, there are 29 ballot box pop-ups across the city.
Despite this, the most advertised way to get your vote out remains by postal box, foisting a starring role onto a postal system that is steadily decreasing in use.
Far North mayoral candidate Moko Tepania said the use of the postal system may be a bit outdated.
“I’m 32 and I’m probably the last generation that can remember sending letters,” he said. “That’s probably why we see national voter turnout at only 43 percent.”
Waerenga-Whitikahu ward councillor candidate Tremayne Thompson said a lot of young people don’t know how to get their vote in.
“Something I found interesting is people my age, by the time we entered the adult world, snail mail was obsolete,” he said. “What I found is a lot of our younger voters don't actually know how to use the system, they don’t know where their office is or where to drop their vote.”
He said a shift towards in-person voting while exploring electronic methods could drive up the ailing turnout.
But in Auckland where the turnout remains even lower that the Far North’s 43 percent, does a distaste for snail mail really account for the staggering number of people who seem to be checked out of local politics?
Another factor could be a demographic disconnect between who is running and who makes up the population.
A Newsroom survey of local body candidates found from a sample of 600 responses a predominance of Pākehā (around two thirds), male (around two thirds) and older candidates (the average age was 51).
Paekākāriki-Raumati ward councillor Sophie Handford said the political disengagement of young people played a big role in keeping numbers down, which she said could be addressed via “things like lowering the voting age, online voting and civics education”.
Having a candidate pool that more accurately reflects the makeup of our society might also help.
“You're probably not going to feel motivated to vote if you aren't seeing somebody with the same values as you,” she said.
Meanwhile, a recent survey by Review in the future of Local Government found 44.8 percent of participants rated their current involvement below average (“not at all” or “a bit”) involved, while 27.2 percent of participants rated their current involvement above average (“very” or “extremely”) involved.
Most participants reported wanting to be more involved, with 98.1 percent wanting at least some involvement in deciding how to achieve their vision for their place in the future.
On top of that, 63.5 percent said they would like for their involvement to be above average (very or extremely) involved.
When it comes to Auckland, it seems numbers like this are somewhat aspirational.
Local Government New Zealand reports a small negative correlation between turnout and council population. This means in a general sense, the higher the population, the lower the turnout.
LGNZ suggests this reflects information problems created when the distance between citizens and their representatives increases.
With a bigger population also comes a more uneven representation ratio - that is, the amount of elected representatives per council member.
In Auckland, that number is around 76,000 people per member of the governing body (that is, ward councillors plus the mayor).
In Whangārei district, that number is around 6500 - less than a tenth of Auckland’s.
“Voting tends to be higher in those councils where the ratio of residents to members is small, that is, each elected member represents a small number of local residents,” LGNZ wrote last election. “This is because members are more likely to be known by potential voters, thus able to better respond to constituents' concerns and it is easier for potential voters to assess policies and performance.”
Having a higher representation ratio means it’s harder for local politicians to reflect the demographics of their constituency.
Like many things, voter disengagement is not equally distributed across Auckland.
Areas with relatively high turnout at the moment tend to be wealthier or more rural.
The Warkworth local board area in Rodney leads the way with a 32.5 percent turnout, while other Rodney areas like Wellsford and Dairy Flat are not far behind.
To the south there’s Franklin, where a third of voters have already turned out to put either local board chair Andy Baker or former All Black Keven Mealamu into council.
Towards the centre of town, areas like Ōrākei, Pakuranga, Howick and Devonport-Takapuna are leading the charge.
Areas on the other end of the turnout spectrum are generally to the south or west and have lower incomes.
These include the Otara local board area, which is only on 15.1 percent, with Papatoetoe just ahead of it. Other areas in the sub-20 percent turnout zone with just two days to go are Manurewa, Māngere-Ōtāhuhu, Papakura and Henderson-Massey.
Curiously, turnout is low in the Botany local board area of the Howick ward - despite being sandwiched between Howick and Pakuranga, two of the areas in the city with the highest turnout.
Turnout is also hinged on the age distribution of these areas.
LGNZ chief executive Susan Freeman-Greene said research shows young people are less likely to get involved in local politics.
“Research tells us that the younger you are, the less likely it is that you’ll be voting in a local election,” she said.
“That’s why boosting youth participation plays an important part in lifting our overall numbers.”
