In her section 7 report declaring the government's voter suppression bill to be inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act, Attorney-General Judith Collins noted that New Zealanders have had an expectation, since 1993, that electors can register to vote either on the day before polling day, or on polling day". Furthermore,
Expectations based on longstanding legislative settings are salient to judging potential prejudice and proportionality.The TL;DR is that the prejudice from such a significant change from those longstanding expectations was more than enough to outweigh the uncertain benefits of the change on the vote-count.
That was for an expectation dating from 1993. But our expectation of being able to enrol at least the day before the election actually goes back much further than that. The relevant law is section 60 of the Electoral Act 1993. Section 60(g) is a recent (2020) addition, and allows same-day voter registration. Section 60(b) is part of the original Act, and allows registration up to the day before the poll. And as the law notes (in the handy little "compare" note at the bottom), it has a history. The current form, allowing voting by anyone who enrols before polling day - dates to 1990 (see s49). But we've allowed late enrolment well before that. The Electoral Act 1956 (s99(b)) allowed newly-qualified voters to register up until polling day, and that provision seems to go back to 1948 (s10). So our expectation that people who have moved or just turned 18 should be able to register right up to the election, and to vote as a result, goes back over three-quarters of a century, and no-one under the age of one hundred has voted under rules as restrictive as those National is proposing.
If a mere 32 year policy setting was a sufficiently longstanding expectation to make change a restriction of the right to vote, what does 77 years of stability - and fewer than 500 people who remember any different - mean?
National's policy is bullshit. It goes against the entire history of our democracy. It cannot be allowed to stand. And nor can they. Throw the tyrants out!
