Election 2023: Voting is the single most important thing on your to-do list this month

Advance voting for the 2023 general election begins today. Photo / Getty Images

OPINION

This column needs to be a few hundred words long but, in reality, it really could be just one:

VOTE.

October is here and, if you are eligible to vote in New Zealand, the most important task on your to do list is to get out and vote.

I know, I understand it’s hard to feel any kind of enthusiasm about it when the two main people in the running are, well, essentially the same person (no offence to whichever of the two Chrises feels offended by this).

Labour leader Chris Hipkins and National leader Chrisopher Luxon during the Newshub Leaders' Debate moderated by Paddy Gower. Photo / Newshub

The reality is that, despite the seemingly lacklustre options, there’s a heck of a lot at stake in this election and, however disempowered you feel (after the last few years, with pandemics and other assorted crises, who can blame you?), voting is the single most powerful thing you can do.

Over the last few weeks, leaders of the different parties have been on the campaign trail pointing out all the ways that things were bad and all the ways they allegedly intend to make them better. If, like me, you’ve been following the updates (shameless plug: I’ve been posting them on nzherald.co.nz most days so join me in this misery if you haven’t yet), you know that there are a lot of things that need fixing in Aotearoa right now.

This is not the time for apathy. We are simultaneously in a cost of living crisis and on the precipice of climate catastrophe, Monday through to Sunday can feel like we’re tightroping into the apocalypse while answering emails, staying on top of laundry and trying to save on our weekly grocery shopping. I understand that, looking at the state of things right now, it’s easy to feel like Beehive bureaucrats are gonna bureaucratise no matter what we do, but that is absolutely not the case. A healthy democracy relies on your vote (yes, yours specifically), as much as anyone else’s.

If you haven’t cared about the election until now, I’ve got brilliant news for you: there’s still heaps of time! If you haven’t enrolled to vote, you still can. If you haven’t learnt anything about the different candidates and their policies, well have I got some light reading to recommend to you!

You’ve got a couple of weeks, with advance voting starting today (October 2). Rather than just voting on a whim or because you feel like “something needs to change”, I urge you to look through the policies of the different parties and use your powers wisely. Find the party policy that most closely aligns with your needs and your priorities and give them your vote.

I could wax lyrical about how many people around the globe, New Zealand included, fought for your right to vote, but I won’t because I don’t want to lecture you (well, I do, I love lecturing people, but I also don’t want to piss you off and I want you to keep reading). So I’ll just remind you of this: your landlord will vote. Your boss will vote. The people who already make decisions that impact your life - people more privileged and more powerful than you - will vote. Their rich mates will vote. They will vote for whoever benefits them. Do not disempower yourself further by opting out of voting.

I’m not telling you who to vote for - but I am asking you that you tick this one task off your list this month.

If nothing else, voting gives you the right to whinge about whatever those in government do next. And I’ll be damned if I ever give up my democratic right to a good whinge.