When defending the low turnout of
voting in Maori wards, WDC Cr Deb Harding recently claimed Maori participation
in voting had been as low as 2%.
We have asked Cr Harding to
provide evidence that this was the case, but no response to the various
requests has been received. We assume Cr Harding won’t back up her claim
because it’s untrue.
This is true: Voter participation
on the Māori roll was 23.8% (less than one in four). Half of those that identify
as Māori choose to be on the general roll, which means only 1 in 8 Māori vote
in Māori wards. So why do we have them?
