According to a report released by Auditor General John Ryan recently, reported by NZ Herald on May 7, last year’s election saw inaccuracies in vote counting due to factors such as missing ballots and input errors. Errors were attributed to challenges in staffing, oversights in review processes, budget pressures, and an unexpected surge in voter registration. Though the number of errors was relatively small and did not affect the overall outcome, even minor errors could have implications.
NZ Herald discovered an error during the scrutiny of election results, leading to further investigations revealing additional issues, including the failure to exclude some instances of ‘double voting’ from the final election results. However, these errors, while very few, did not alter the final election outcomes in any district.
The Electoral Commission has briefed Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith, the Ministry of Justice, and officials responsible for overseeing the recount on the situation. Chief Electoral Officer Karl Le Quesne expressed remorse over the occurrence of errors and emphasized the priority of enhancing the existing systems and review processes while conducting elections with integrity.
Additionally, the report mentioned that nearly 454,000 people registered in the two weeks leading up to the election, with approximately 110,000 registering on the election day, a number far exceeding the Electoral Commission’s expectations. There were around 600,000 special votes, 100,000 more than the 2020 election, with processing times ten times longer than regular votes.
The Auditor General recommended updating quality assurance checks, review processes, and evaluating the staffing levels as well as hardware and technical requirements for elections. The idea of granting “budget independence” to electoral agencies was proposed by the Auditor General to enhance future election processes.