Tçnâ koe David,

Thank you for your Official Information Act 1982 (the Act) request to the Department of Internal Affairs (Department).

You have requested:

1. The overall turnout percentage for the local body elections from 1983 to 2016 inclusive.
2. Which elections were the first held under postal voting.

Please note - as FYI.org.nz removes weblinks from email responses, links I am providing to the publicly available information would not be included with my email. For this reason, I have indicated below in my response where there is a link and have also included a simple word document version of my response, in which the links should still be accessible for you. If you have any problem accessing the links, please email the department at our OIA email address for further assistance. You can find the Department's OIA email address on the contact page on the Department of Internal Affairs website.

In response to part 1 of your request:
A range of information about elections is publicly available on the Department’s website, including voter turnout for the period from 2001-2016. Some graphs included in that material also provide voter turnout for the period from 1989 to 2016 (link). You may also wish to review the website (link), which has captured a range of graphs related to local elections, including voter turnout for the period from 1989 to 2016 (link).

In addition, the National Library of New Zealand holds a publication series titled ‘Local Authority Election Statistics’, which provides detailed information and statistics (including voter turnout) for the election years 1980, 1983, and 1989 through to 2010. The Alexander Turnbull Library holds a copy of the same publication back to the 1977 election year. (link). Please contact the National Library directly to find out more about how to access this series.

Despite reasonable search, we were not able to find information on voter turnout for the 1986 year. The Department is therefore refusing this part of your request under 18(g) of the Act, as the information is not held by the Department, and as we are not aware of any other body that will hold the information for all local bodies. You may possibly be able to collate this data from records held by individual Councils.

In response to part 2 of your request:
We also found no information regarding which local body was the first to adopt postal voting. This part of your request is therefore also refused under section 18(g) of the Act. Some information on the first general adoption of postal voting is available online: (link)

Please note that in cases where the Department’s response provides information that is identified to be of general public interest, the response may also be published on the Department of Internal Affairs website. If the Department publishes its response to your OIA request, all personal information, including your name and contact details, will be removed.

Ngâ mihi

Michelle Reed | Lead Advisor – Official Correspondence 
Te Urungi - Organisational Strategy and Performance
Te Tari Taiwhenua - The Department of Internal Affairs
45 Pipitea St | PO Box 805, Wellington 6140, New Zealand |  www.dia.govt.nz

show quoted sections