ABSENTEE VOTERS

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 110, 5 November 1925, Page 8

ABSENTEE VOTERS

A FEATURE OF THE POLLING.

Applications to record absentee votes were very numerous in Wellington South yesterday,' the number at the previous election being practically doubled. In many cases the applicants were resident in other city electorates, and there Vv'ere even instances of voters demanding to vote as absentees although they were within easy reach of polling booths in their own electorates. Their right to vote v.-as recognised, but in consequence much inconvenience was caused, together with an extra amount of work, not only for the returning officers and staffs but for the telegraph offices. -At the principal booth for Wellington South—the Nowtown Library—over a score of electors of Wellington East, a portion of which electorate is on the opposite side of the road, applied to vote as absentees, when there was a booth practically a stone's throw (at tho Victoria Hall) in their own electoral district. There,were, of course, applications by residents of other districts, and the experience was much the same at other booths. , Tho big increase in the munbr of absentee votes was also noted in the case of those coming in from other parts. They, too, were doubled.

Asked if ho had heard of many instances of voters who were within comparatively easy distance of their own polling places voting at others not far away, the Chief Electoral Officer, Mr. G. G. Hodgkins, said to-day that he had not, nor did he think that there had been many. • "It is not obligatory upon ■a returning officer to refuse to accept a vote even though the voter seeks to record it, as an absent vote at a polling place not-far from those in his own electorate," he remarked. "He may permit it if he is satisfied that there are special circumstances making it difficult or very inconvenient for the -oter to vote at his own polling places. The absent voting system does not apply in the cases of city electorates, where electors are able to record in their own electorales before the time for the closing of the poll, except in tho special kind of circumstances "I have indicated, and unless the elector can satisfy the deputies that there is no possibility of his returning to his own electorate before closing time. Taking the case of such a man wishing' to record, say, in the Wellington South polling booth, though an elector of the Wellington Suburbs electorate, he could vote as an absent voter. The law does not allow absent voters' permits to any but strictly absent voters, but the returning officers are permitted the exercise of their discretion in exceptional circumstances."