Students vote on internet

By ADAM GIFFORD

Students at the Auckland University of Technology are holding what they say is New Zealand's first internet election in a bid to cut costs and increase voting numbers.

"It's important from both a local and national perspective that we get a strong mandate," said outgoing president Michael Heard.

"Across the board in society it's becoming hard for people to get strong mandates through elections."

About 1200 of AUT's 15,000 students voted last year. Membership of the Students' Movement (AuSM) is compulsory.

AuSM is using Election.com, a New York election services firm that established a presence in New Zealand by buying Christchurch company Accent.

Mr Heard said he heard of Election.com when it ran the Arizona Democratic presidential primary, the first legally binding public election over the internet.

He contacted New Zealand managing director Steve Kilpatrick after a Business Herald report on the Accent buy.

"We went with Election.com because we wanted a professional organisation which we could rely on and which had integrity, so we could be sure the results were safe."

Mr Heard said the election, which started at 8.30 am yesterday and runs until 4 pm on Friday, had gone down well on campus.

"There's a high take-up of technology at AUT, so no one saw doing the election this way as a problem."

Mr Kilpatrick said the election was New Zealand's first over the internet.

"The software is sitting in a secure server in New York. The students will be voting from PCs on campus or at home.

"For authentication, students enter their student ID number and we ask them challenge questions that we generate from a snapshot we've taken of the university's enrolment data. They're then able to cast their vote."

Students can vote for the president, vice-president, sports officers and executive members. Ethnicity data given at enrolment determines whether they can cast votes for the Maori and Pacifica representatives.

Mr Kilpatrick said the cost was confidential, "but it's cost-efficient."

"If you're doing a postal ballot, it doesn't take long before it costs $1 a ballot in printing and postage just to get the paper out and back, without any processing.

"It's also easier to make changes. Last Thursday we had a change in the ballot paper. That couldn't be done if we were printing it."

The results will be out by 5 pm on Friday.