Opinion piece by Kathryn Ennis-Carter

The result of the local government elections in October 2025 was a ‘mixed bag’ and is still being analysed for trends and significance. During the campaign there was evidence of some consistent themes across the country, including push-back against high rates increases, perceptions of wasteful spending and bureaucratic over-reach and resistance to (or support for) ‘woke agendas’ ranging from Drag Queen story-telling in libraries to perceptions of radicalised climate change action.  In some districts there appears to have been a definite move for change, with sitting Mayors and Councillors losing their seats. But in other cities/districts where change might have been predicted in line with the above concerns, many ‘status quo’ Mayors and Councillors have remained. Why?

One explanation much mentioned is low voter turnout – less than 50% pretty much everywhere, with the average settling around 40%. Low voter turnout has historically been a feature of local government elections.  But commentators have speculated about the reasons why that was repeated again this year, even with an increased decline in voter turnout in many areas, despite evidence of growing ratepayer concerns about how councils are operating. 

In the context of general apathy, most people operate on the basis that ‘politics’ is largely nothing to do with them. They (mostly) turn out to vote at general elections, and (mostly) engage in a three-yearly tennis match of bouncing between the two centre-left or centre-right main parties, without much delving into the detail of political policy choices. Local government has traditionally been perceived as an even lesser priority than central government. As a result many people have been relatively uninterested and mostly happy to trust councils to get on with delivering basic community services, without the public having to get too exercised about voting. 

In addition to general apathy however, some commentators have noted an increasing ‘opt out in disillusionment’ phenomenon, arising from an increasing lack of trust in government generally. There is indication that there is an escalating percentage of people who think there is little point in voting – based on an increased sense of resignation that politicians will do what they want anyway, regardless of what communities think or want.  Similarly, while local councils are increasingly being perceived as corporate juggernauts indulging in bureaucratic over-reach, there is also a perception that the public can do little or nothing about it – so why bother?

All of the above reasons have validity in both anecdotal observation and statistical evidence. However, there is another reason for the low voter turnout – which is that there is much to indicate that a significant number of people do not understand our systems of governance, both at central and local government level. People will not participate actively in what they don’t understand. Therefore the ‘opt out’ and ‘politics isn’t my thing’ responses are predictably increasing.

Ultimately this is a failure of education, as well as a failure of governance. 

New Zealand does not have ‘civics’ education in schools – as in America, for example. As a result, most of our young people leave secondary school and even tertiary level education without much of a clue about either the principles of our constitutional system of democracy and governance, or how government actually works in practical terms. This is a tragedy, because leaving people without a confident understanding of how governance should work undermines confidence in how the public can influence government and be involved in holding government to account.  It also leaves people frustrated in not understanding the extent to which some issues are systemic and not immediately within the control of any new bunch of politicians to jump to and change things the moment their behinds hit the Parliamentary benches.  

This goes way beyond the fact that most people think that what takes place in Parliament is what the media shows them – shouting matches across the benches at Question Time and the fun and games of Green Party accusations and hakas and protests orchestrated by Te Pati Maori. There have been notable recent examples where even leaders in the political domain (who should know better) or so-called ‘political commentators’ in the media have demonstrated that they do not understand the basics of our constitutional and government systems and institutional arrangements.

A short article/blog statement written by John Tamihere has recently been doing the rounds on social media. In this meme, Tamihere wails that the current Government is ‘wiping away half a century of hard-won progress Maori have made within this country’s constitutional system’. He complains that the Government is ‘using the machinery of regulation to reassert political dominance over the courts’ and questions whether Court decisions should be able to be changed on the basis of ‘who has the numbers’ in Parliament. 

Sorry John – that’s the system. Governance in a democracy is essentially a system of law and order, actioned via the three branches of government. Many people are not aware of what these branches are – the Legislature (Parliament), the Executive (the public service) and the Judiciary (the Courts and the justice system). In our Westminster constitutional system, Parliament makes the law, the Executive implements the law and the Judiciary interprets the law.  And in this system, Parliament is supreme.  ‘Regulation’ is the business of Parliament, via the process of reviewing proposed new legislation, making amendments to existing legislation and repealing other legislation.  Therefore no decision or ruling by the Courts is sacrosanct – Parliament can at any time overturn it, change it or redirect it through the boring process of ‘regulation’, which yes, depends on ‘who has the numbers’.  

So if you don’t like it John, go to the United States, where the founding fathers set up the three Branches of Government as equal, with checks and balances in their interaction, and where the President’s role is head of the Executive and the Judiciary (at all levels) can formally challenge decisions and actions of both the Congress and the Executive. This results in considerable blockages which are inherent in the system. This explains why the Government (public service) can be shut down if the Congress doesn’t approve the Budget put forward by the President.

During the 2023 general election campaign in New Zealand, it became clear that many people still do not understand the basic mechanics of our MMP voting system. In some quarters there was a discussion and aggravation about ‘wasted votes’, when people realised that if the Party they had voted for did not make the 5% threshold, those votes were re-allocated among the Parties that did, on a pro-rata basis reflecting the proportional distribution of voting. 

The same confusions exist in relation to local government. During the 2025 local government election, it became clear to many who were working with various ratepayer and residents’ groups that many people had trouble understanding the local government voting system. Many voters appeared to struggle in understanding the system of wards and district-wide councillors and how to exercise their vote in that regard.  Some people were even unclear who ‘the staff’ are, and the difference in roles and responsibilities between elected members and staff. 

And for those Councils which use the Single Transferable Vote (STV) system, many people did not understand the concept of ranking of candidates and how ranking of all candidates could result in their votes being ‘re-allocated’ to people who might be their least preferred candidates. 

It is also clear that many people do not understand the mechanisms built into the system for citizens to participate in governance between elections through the process of making submissions to Select Committees considering various legislation.  At central government level, the general pattern on numbers of submissions on various subjects is usually less than 10,000 (that is, less than 0.2% of the adult voting public). That trend generally only varies when the media has significantly featured the issue – such as the Treaty Principles Bill. Many people simply do not know how to make submissions, write to Cabinet Ministers or otherwise take part in governance processes other than voting every three years.

At local government level, the number of submissions to Council and participation in Council ‘consultation’ is abysmally even lower – unless, again, there is a community issue that has attracted a lot of media coverage.

And most recently, when the Government announced planned changes to regional councils, it became abundantly clear that many people do not understand the functions of regional councils at all, including media commentators who were obviously floundering in presenting what the changes might mean.  Again, it became clear that many in the general public do not even realise how they are paying for regional councils through their rates paid to city and district councils. 

So what is the reason why our national education system has failed to educate decades of students about the governance system that we are all a part of and which affects all of us?  

Some would cynically say that it’s because an un-educated population is a compliant and politically inactive population. Or maybe it’s just laziness and lack of political awareness on the part of the education sector in making civics education part of the basic curriculum.  Or perhaps it’s just more interesting for teachers to send kids out on climate change protests than it is to educate them about our governance system and the realities of how to really  influence government decisions.

Kathryn Ennis-Carter is a Governance and Public Management Consultant and on the committee of Concerned Ratepayers Kapiti. This was written originally for City Watch NZ