{"id":77241,"date":"2025-10-14T06:36:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T06:36:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/77241\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T06:36:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T06:36:07","slug":"northlands-kaipara-district-records-one-of-the-highest-voter-turnouts-in-new-zealand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/77241\/","title":{"rendered":"Northland\u2019s Kaipara District records one of the highest voter turnouts in New Zealand"},"content":{"rendered":"

It comes amid concerns about falling turnout in much of the country<\/a> \u2013 the national average is 38%, according to Local Government NZ \u2013 and mounting calls for change in the way council elections are run.<\/p>\n

Kaipara<\/a> also has one of the tightest mayoral races in the country.<\/p>\n

In the preliminary results, current Deputy Mayor Jonathan Larsen is five votes ahead of iwi leader Snow Tane<\/a>, and 31 votes ahead of two-time former mayor Jason Smith.<\/p>\n

Smith said Kaipara\u2019s turnout was a win, whatever the outcome of the election.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat makes me so damned proud of the people of Kaipara is that they\u2019ve got stuck in and voted,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople have been activated to vote either because they wanted something different or they wanted more of the same, but they\u2019ve been activated to vote. This is all very good for democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith said the close, three-horse race proved what he had been saying throughout the campaign \u2013 that every vote was important.<\/p>\n

Larsen said strong and contrasting views among Kaipara residents had boosted the turnout.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that the public are very engaged in politics at the moment and quite strongly positioned in terms of their political beliefs. So that\u2019s represented in the turnout we\u2019re seeing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Tane said the close result reflected what he had seen on the campaign trail.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have definitely been some voices among our constituents for change. And there were some voices out there for consistency, and you can see those two opinions in the voting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tane said many candidates were well known in their communities, which had also helped to lift the turnout.<\/p>\n

Smith said those who made the extra effort to cast special votes deserved acknowledgment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are really determined to exercise their democratic right. Those people have to go really out of their way. It\u2019s not just opening an envelope at the kitchen table and then putting it in the letter box. They have to ring or go to the council or the special voting booth. They have to take time and push and push. So those people are the real champions of democracy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Kaipara\u2019s turnout has been increasing steadily in recent years. It was 42.6% in 2019 and 47.6% in 2022.<\/p>\n

In the Far North, where Mayor Moko Tepania was returned with a 4300-vote majority<\/a>, turnout was 48.8%, up from 41.5% in 2022 and 47.5% in 2019.<\/p>\n

In Whang\u0101rei, where councillor Ken Couper is narrowly ahead of incumbent Vince Cocurullo<\/a> in the mayoral race, 44.2% had a say, compared with 43.3% in 2022 and 45% in 2019.<\/p>\n

According to Local Government NZ, Chatham Islanders had the highest turnout in the country (68.34%), followed by Kaik\u014dura (59.37%), McKenzie (59.13%), South Wairarapa (58.16%) and Kaipara (57.37%).<\/p>\n

The lowest was in Auckland (28.74%).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It comes amid concerns about falling turnout in much of the country \u2013 the national average is 38%,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":77242,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[7557,60157,4729,78,23157,117,111,43,139,24926,69,1118,5270,5413,9090,223,60156,60155,80],"class_list":["post-77241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-district","tag-graaf","tag-highest","tag-in","tag-kaipara","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-northlands","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-one","tag-peter","tag-records","tag-the","tag-turnouts","tag-voter","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77241"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77241\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}