Bilingual voting booths set up to entice Māori to vote

Fifteen bilingual voting booths, also known as Kaupapa Māori locations, are being stood up around the country to help get more Māori voting.

One located at Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Kaikohe in Northland is staffed mostly by wharekura students.

Voting place manager Kanewa Harrison revealed they’ve had an influx of new enrolments and voters, from rangatahi to kaumātua.

“A lot of our kaumātua and kuia [are] native speakers. We're getting a lot more of them coming through and our rangatahi Māori are able to explain the process to them in te reo Māori."

“I think it's awesome,” said student Maioha Upperton. “We greet our guests with te reo Māori, o te reo o te kāinga (language spoken at home), we have a cup of tea, stand for our elderly – I think it just makes a more comfortable environment for voters.”

It is the second time bilingual voting places have been made available in a general election, with the first in 2020, hosted at Te Wharekura o Rakaumangamanga in Huntly.

In addition, 37 marae-based voting locations are being set up.

The push is in response to historically low Māori voter turn-out and a recent study by Massey University into negative Māori voting experiences during the 2020 general election. It found some voting places had no Māori roll or voting ballots for Māori, staff lacked training in regard to the Māori roll, leading to longer wait times, and in some cases, voters experienced discriminatory attitudes.

Māori voter Vicki Frewin said she found the voting experience disempowering after she had to cast a special vote when the booth she visited had no Māori roll. She said she was left feeling like “no one cared about my vote”.

“I could see how people would be disheartened, it’s almost embarrassing when they can’t find you, you know? Because everyone’s going, ‘where’s this?’ and it’s like, ‘oh my god, this is a small room, can you not make a big deal out of this, thanks’.

“Māori have been disenfranchised, I think, with this whole issue of not having a Māori roll at every place and have every person working there understand that there’s a separate roll, and that we’re entitled to vote just as easily as anyone else.”

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