The Annual Report of the Electoral Commission, Te Kaitiaki Take Kōwhiri, for the year ended 30 June 2007 was tabled in the House of Representatives on 8 November 2007.  The key points section of the report follows, while the full report is available for download as a .pdf under Downloads to the right.

Key points

Organisational

• The Elections New Zealand website continues as the primary form of publication for guidance, research and education. It was ranking third best Crown entity site at 30 June.
• The Commission moved to new, smaller premises and adopted a new logo aligned to the Elections New Zealand logo shared with the other electoral agencies.
• An external review of staff capacity to deliver the Commission’s outputs resulted in redefinition of some job responsibilities and a 0.5 reduction in full-time equivalent staff.

Registered political parties and logos

• The laxness of registered political parties in meeting deadlines for the filing of statutory returns, also noted last year, has not improved and continues to cause concern.
• Public interest in aspects of electoral finance was high, leading to a number of requests for presentations on this issue. Following a report by the Controller and Auditor General on election-related spending of parliamentary funds, and publication of The Hollow Men, the Commission invited parties to review their returns of election expenses, and published a legal opinion confirming the legality of parties using trusts as donations vehicles.

International assistance

• Commission staff expertise was provided to assist others building democratic capacity. Work in Timor-Leste, with MFAT/NZAID, scoped and delivered assistance focusing on voter information needs and the role of the news media during Timor-Leste’s 2007 elections.
• The Commission designed and facilitated a workshop attended by civics educators from the Pacific. A fledgling professional development network was formed as a result.
• Resources were provided on New Zealand’s adoption of MMP through the website.

Promotion of public awareness of electoral matters

• Resource creation, presentations and research consolidated the existing public awareness programme. Research concentrated on gaining a better understanding of why some people, including Māori and young people, do not participate in elections in similar proportions to others. A one-day conference presenting four commissioned research reports on Māori participation was a highlight.
• New resources were prepared and published for teachers, and for people unfamiliar with how to engage in New Zealand’s political life.

Publicity in connection with the next general election

• In preparation for the next general election priority audiences and messages were identified. Funding was sought to ensure a similar election public information campaign to past elections could be run. If such funding continues to be unavailable then the 2008 information campaign will be about half that of each of the past three elections.