How do we get more people out to vote?

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Forums › Politics › How do we get more people out to vote?

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Ultimate Geek
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#1134288 23-Sep-2014 08:50

Get everyone on the roll setup and checked via a 2 step authentication process for online voting.

setup a neat simple easy to use 2 or max 3 page web page so that even a kid can understand it.

voting online. results = instantaneous !

Geektastic

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#1134291 23-Sep-2014 08:53

nate: What are your ideas for encouraging more people to vote? Online voting? Mobile voting? Mandatory voting like Australia?

Let's try and keep political party preferences out of this.

Bribery.

Everyone who votes gets a ticket that goes in a Lotto-style draw with an electorate prize and a national prize.

ubergeeknz

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Vocus

#1134323 23-Sep-2014 09:53

DjShadow: 1. Location of polling booths: Consider setting up in shopping malls, supermarkets, gas stations even. Put them where people usually are on a Saturday so remove the need for a special trip

There were polling booths literally everywhere. Seriously. Almost every school or church had a polling booth, at least in the places I was on Saturday.

2. Electronic Voting: We can do our Census online, vote for our local energy trust membership online, why not the general election?

So many reasons this is a bad idea, transparency being one, preventing coercion being another, but anyway the current system works very well for the population size. There are ways to vote without going to a polling booth already for people who really cannot make it.

3. Consider changing the voting system to Single Transferable vote (STV), about 7% of the party vote was wasted in the weekend because the conservative party didn't make it to 5%

Now this would be good. It would remove the need to vote strategically from the equation, people could confidently vote for whatever small party they like without fear of wasting a vote.

Another thing is I'd like to see polls banned a week or even a month out from an election. Or just outright. They don't serve democracy well IMO.

Finch

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#1134324 23-Sep-2014 09:53

Geektastic:
nate: What are your ideas for encouraging more people to vote? Online voting? Mobile voting? Mandatory voting like Australia?

Let's try and keep political party preferences out of this.

Bribery.

Everyone who votes gets a ticket that goes in a Lotto-style draw with an electorate prize and a national prize.

Was going to suggest something similar. Should just pay everyone $5 to vote.

Geektastic

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#1134337 23-Sep-2014 09:58

Finch:
Geektastic:
nate: What are your ideas for encouraging more people to vote? Online voting? Mobile voting? Mandatory voting like Australia?

Let's try and keep political party preferences out of this.

Bribery.

Everyone who votes gets a ticket that goes in a Lotto-style draw with an electorate prize and a national prize.

Was going to suggest something similar. Should just pay everyone $5 to vote.

I don't think $5 would be enough motivation.

An electorate prize or two of say $10,000 and a Grand Prize of $50,000 would have them out in droves I reckon!

PhantomNVD

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#1134377 23-Sep-2014 10:28

gotta say I do think a vote lottery would work very well, but as someone who DID 'bother' to vote and somehow "wasted" my vote on a party that was not elected I'm very intrigued with the STV concept.

I think I'd also like the barrier to representation on MMP to be proportional to the seats... if there are (rounded) 200 MP's chosen, then each 1% of the vote should allocate 2 MPs. thus the farce of "7% of the voting turnout was 'wasted' anyway" would be done away with, and I might be more inclined to 'bother' to vote next time too!

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bazzer

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#1134416 23-Sep-2014 11:04

PhantomNVD: gotta say I do think a vote lottery would work very well, but as someone who DID 'bother' to vote and somehow "wasted" my vote on a party that was not elected I'm very intrigued with the STV concept.

I think I'd also like the barrier to representation on MMP to be proportional to the seats... if there are (rounded) 200 MP's chosen, then each 1% of the vote should allocate 2 MPs. thus the farce of "7% of the voting turnout was 'wasted' anyway" would be done away with, and I might be more inclined to 'bother' to vote next time too!

This is exactly how it works. With our current system, you "only" have to get 0.83% (probably more like 0.42% if they round up the number of seats) of the vote to get each of your party's seats in Parliament. To minimise fragmentation you need to have a threshold. It doesn't really do anyone any good to have a bunch of parties with a single MP. Legalise Cannabis very nearly got enough support to "earn" a seat and they only got 8,500 votes!

Lyderies

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Ultimate Geek
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#1134475 23-Sep-2014 12:04

If i only had to register once, i would be more inclined to go vote,

As it stands i called the electoral office and the guy i spoke to said i couldn't register (this was 2 weeks before voting) and told me i couldn't vote

I ended up talking to a friend and they told me i could still register so i called them again, this time they told me it was to late but they will send me a form anyway,

Still haven't received the form yet, ended up at the pub early Saturday as my flat mate went to vote, he came back and told me i could do a special vote (and the special vote line was 1/5 of the register line), so i ended up doing a special vote

If i didn't have to go through all that trouble i would quite happily vote, otherwise i wont be bothering

I'm going to noob myself past judgement

PhantomNVD

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#1134482 23-Sep-2014 12:19

bazzer:
PhantomNVD: gotta say I do think a vote lottery would work very well, but as someone who DID 'bother' to vote and somehow "wasted" my vote on a party that was not elected I'm very intrigued with the STV concept.

I think I'd also like the barrier to representation on MMP to be proportional to the seats... if there are (rounded) 200 MP's chosen, then each 1% of the vote should allocate 2 MPs. thus the farce of "7% of the voting turnout was 'wasted' anyway" would be done away with, and I might be more inclined to 'bother' to vote next time too!

This is exactly how it works. With our current system, you "only" have to get 0.83% (probably more like 0.42% if they round up the number of seats) of the vote to get each of your party's seats in Parliament. To minimise fragmentation you need to have a threshold. It doesn't really do anyone any good to have a bunch of parties with a single MP. Legalise Cannabis very nearly got enough support to "earn" a seat and they only got 8,500 votes!

but how do they 'almost' get a seat with .83 and conservative NOT get even one with 4.1???

is it then worth a party 'pooling' their votes in a small area to get the area rep to be an MP? Is this how the Mauri Party get their seat with so many fewer voters - voter concentration?

ubergeeknz

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Vocus

#1134483 23-Sep-2014 12:20

Lyderies: If i only had to register once, i would be more inclined to go vote,

As it stands i called the electoral office and the guy i spoke to said i couldn't register (this was 2 weeks before voting) and told me i couldn't vote

I ended up talking to a friend and they told me i could still register so i called them again, this time they told me it was to late but they will send me a form anyway,

Still haven't received the form yet, ended up at the pub early Saturday as my flat mate went to vote, he came back and told me i could do a special vote (and the special vote line was 1/5 of the register line), so i ended up doing a special vote

If i didn't have to go through all that trouble i would quite happily vote, otherwise i wont be bothering

Seems to be a lot of misinformation out there, including from those who should know. You are able to enrol right up to and including the day before the Election. And as you said, you can lodge a special vote so long as you're eligible.

wasabi2k

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#1134485 23-Sep-2014 12:22

If you vote, you get a card stating you did.

If you didn't, you don't.

For the next 3 years, anyone wanting to discuss a political topic, decision made by a political party etc, would be required to produce their card. If you don't have one you shut up or get fined $250 - instantly.

First time voters get an exemption.

(Yes I am joking).

Online voting gives me the heebee jeebees. Given governments the world over's ability to provide highly capable online systems that are secure I really don't have any faith in it being done well.

Look at America's voting machines for a good example of technology done badly.

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MikeB4

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#1134494 23-Sep-2014 12:27

It is up to the Political Party's to put up candidates people want to vote for and present policies that attract the public. Maybe this year the Left of spectrum supporters saw no value in their candidates or policies and decided not to vote. In NZ people tend to vote down Party lines and wont vote if they don't see their particular Party offering anything to them, they seldom swap sides. There is a percentage of swinging voters but I would suggest that they only amount to somewhere less than 10%.

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

DravidDavid

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#1134506 23-Sep-2014 12:42

ubergeeknz:

Another thing is I'd like to see polls banned a week or even a month out from an election. Or just outright. They don't serve democracy well IMO.

I find this a really big problem too. If polls aren't allowed on election day, they should not be allowed full stop. It tempts people in to the majority basket instead of the individual otherwise making an informed decision based on who they think is best to lead the country.

Instead of "I'm voting for them, because I want to vote for the winner!" it might be more like "Which policies are important to me and which reflect my views the best?"

Compulsory voting is a silly idea. Online voting might be problematic. I could see "hackers" tripling votes, taking them away or generally causing havok for giggles skewing results.

If one million voters failed to turn out, perhaps it's not a flawed voting system that is the problem...Everyone seems to be blaming the weather, lazy people or a wavering interest in politics, but I don't think this is the case. The decline has been forcasted to continue for elections to come.

We will probably be forced to vote once we hit a majority of non voters.

hashbrown

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Ultimate Geek
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#1134514 23-Sep-2014 12:51

People not voting is symptomatic of a general disease of complacency and apathy. If you treat the symptom with the gimics proposed here, nothing is solved.

I beleive we need better civics lessons in schools. Teach kids what existed before democracy, and why it is important. Remind them that people fought and died for the freedoms we now take for granted.

If you can't be bothered to get off the couch and vote every three years, you don't deserve to be a citizen of this country. The same goes for jury service.

Dratsab

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#1134562 23-Sep-2014 13:50

nate: What are your ideas for encouraging more people to vote? Online voting? Mobile voting? Mandatory voting like Australia?

Let's try and keep political party preferences out of this.

I tend to disagree with the apathy call that keeps being put up. I subscribe more to the idea of a population becoming increasingly disenfranchised with matters such as the growing social divide, seemingly being driven by politicians becoming further and further detached from the people they're supposed to be representing.

IMHO, the way to get more people to vote is for politicians themselves to sort out by becoming more socially active/responsible.

Edit: split sentences, better grammar

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