Voters dragging their feet with a week to go

Wanganui voters are dragging their feet in the 2013 local body elections.

The number of voting papers returned up to yesterday is well down on the same period in the 2010 elections.

Wanganui electoral officer Noeline Moosman said around midday yesterday that 9275 papers had been returned which represents 29.9 per cent of the electorate.

That means there are another 21,712 papers still to be returned and there's only seven days to go before voting closes. A week out from the election three years ago 34 per cent of papers had been returned.

She said it would be helpful if voters got their voting papers in sooner rather than later. Voting closes at midday next Saturday.

"And we need to remind voters that the election for the Whanganui District Health Board is on the Single Transferable Voting (STV) system which requires voters to number the candidates in order of preference. They must not be ticked. Any voting paper that is ticked immediately becomes invalid," she said.

In 2007, nearly 7 per cent of votes - 1747 of them - were disallowed because voters had incorrectly filled in the voting papers. Three years later it was 5.7 per cent, or 1363 votes.

Candidates for the Wanganui mayoralty, Wanganui District Council and the Horizons Regional Council are elected through the First Past the Post (FPP) system. Under FPP voters tick only one preferred candidate out of three for the mayoralty, 12 candidates out of 36 for the district council and two out of three for the regional council.