Keeping Eye On Voters

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31224, 23 November 1966, Page 28

Keeping Eye On Voters

(N.Z. Press Association) PALMERSTON NORTH, Nov. 21. On election day an officially recognised appointee—a scrutineer —■ sits at every polling place and, in an electoral roll which is his own property, marks off each voter by name or takes his voting number as he comes to vote.

This is a correct legal procedure. But a statement by Mr G. H. Spooner, Labour candidate for Wanganui, shows that the marked rolls are kept and may later be used, when a constituent comes to the member for help, to see whether at the election he “took the trouble to vote.”

At a political meeting in Wanganui on November 19, Mr Spooner said: “It is not much help your believing Mr Kirk should be Prime Minister if you will not make that effort to get out and vote.

“I can call to mind three people who have approached me for help and a check of the marked roll showed that at the last election they did not vote. “One man for the three last elections had not gone to the booth. Election time is when every citizen counts, so make sure you record your vote.” The returning officer at Palmerston North (Mr O. T. Grattan) said that the marking of their own rolls by party scrutineers was a correct procedure. The rolls were on sale at the courthouse. He believed the main purpose of the marking was to let parties have a last-minute round-up of their laggard supporters late on election day, and later to analyse the voting.

After the election any action taken by party organisers on their use of the information was a matter for their own ethical code. In Palmerston North, the Labour candidate, Mr J. Walding, was not available for comment.

The National Party organiser (Mr F. H. Blatchford) said: “Apart from checking of voters by scrutineers at the polling booths a master marked roll is kept at the courthouse after the election. This is available to accredited officials of all political parties. “After an election all parties make a study of this marked role as a guide to analysing results: finding reasons why some people did or did not vote, and generally seeing where they went wrong. “As for using the marked roll, when a constituent came to a member for help, to see

whether he troubled to exercise his vote, I would consider this to be quite unethical,” Mr Blatchford said.