Greens call for check on special votes after downloading glitch

The Green Party is writing to the Electoral Office asking it to sort out the problem of corrupted ballot papers sent in by overseas voters.

Greens co-leader Rod Donald said yesterday that he knew of two instances where his party's name had been blanked out on downloaded ballot papers, and was worried there could be more.

The situation was first revealed last week, and the Electoral Office said it appeared to have been a problem with some voters' laptop software or printer set-ups.

Assistant chief electoral officer Robert Peden said some voters had found all the parties blanked out, and had contacted the office's help desk to download a properly printed paper.

He said fewer than 10 people had sought help for such a problem.

But Mr Donald said he wanted returning officers to carefully check all 218,000 special votes to ensure they are in order.

"I will write to the Electoral Office tomorrow. I will ask that all returning officers check whether the ballot papers were complete, or deficient in some ways," he said.

Mr Donald said he did not dispute it was a download problem, and he was not questioning the integrity of the electoral process.

"They're going to count each special vote individually anyway, they could put aside any that aren't printed out properly," he said.

"We need to know sooner rather than later whether it's a minor or major problem, because if the result is close next Saturday then somebody may go for a judicial recount, whether it's us or another party."

On past performance, the Greens have a good chance of winning an extra seat on special votes, giving them seven, and National would lose one.

- NZPA