The Electoral Commission should be forced to release daily post-election results
The Post reports:
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith and the Electoral Commission are in open disagreement over the date they will be able to deliver full election results, following Goldsmith’s controversial law aimed at speeding up the count.
The Electoral Commission confirmed last week following the announcement of the election for November 7 that full results ‒ including the impact of special votes ‒ would not come until 20 days after the election on November 27, the same period of time it took in 2023.
This is despite a law passed by Goldsmith late last year which banned voters from enrolling during the advance voting period or on election day, aimed at speeding up the final count ‒ with Goldsmith targeting a return to a two-week counting period.
While some elections are obvious enough to be called “on the night”, the tendency for special votes to change a few seats have held up coalition talks from starting in both the 2017 and the 2023 elections.
There is a simple solution here and that is for the Electoral Commission to release daily updates on the revised vote count post-election. This is absolutely standard practice around much of the world. It is ridiculous that on election night we have 100% transparency over the results and then you have a 20 day blackout where no-one but a couple of officials know what is happening with the vote count.
The reality is that by the end of Monday or Tuesday after the election, 90% or more of the special votes are probably counted and known. Daily updates would allow people to work out what the likely distribution of MPs are to a high degree of probability.
This is what used to happen in NZ when the Ministry of Justice used to do the vote count. But the Electoral Commission has refused to do this.
At 5 pm every day after E-Day the Electoral Commission should disclose the latest vote tallies. This would allow people to judge the very very likely final MPs numbers for the purpose of government formation.
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