Electoral Referendum Bill Report

The Electoral Referendum Bill has also been reported back. Major aspects are:

  • Comes into force 1 Jan 2011
  • aligns advertising rules with Electoral , including $300,000 limit
  • MMP to only be reviewed if people vote for it to remain, not if they vote for change. So any run-off referendum will be with the current version of MMP
  • Order of alternate voting systems to be alphabetical
  • ballot papers will not be counted on E Day, but the results of advance votes will be known which should indicate the likely result
  • The SM option has been defined as a 90/30 option. is quite significant as it means it will be significantly less proportional than MMP. My preferred SM option would be 70/50 as MMP currently has. On the plus side a 90/30 system will have smaller electorate .

The question in Part A has been modified to be:

Should New Zealand keep the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) voting system?

The options are:

  • I vote to keep the MMP voting system
  • I vote to change to another voting system

The select committee has done a diligent job with the bill. Politically I believe a majority will vote to retain MMP, especially with the SM option being significantly disproportional.

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