Comments by "Laurence Fraser" (@laurencefraser) on "The New York Times"
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Voters aren't registered automatically in New Zealand either. But the whole system is set up to make it as easy to register as possible. The difference between enrolling in the first place and informing the relevant officials of a change of address is... Negligible.
Having been in jail in the past doesn't disqualify you. Being In Jail At The Time doesn't disqualify you if your sentence is short enough (basically, if you would miss out on voting in only a single election entirely due to when the system got around to sentencing you, you can still vote, but if your sentence is long enough that you would miss the election regardless you don't get to vote until you get out.)
Note that our votes are done Entirely on paper, in part because it is so much easier to subvert electronic systems without leaving evidence that any such action took place. (Well, I'm not 100% sure on that if you're casting your vote from overseas, but certainly otherwise).
This year the polling stations were open for two weeks before "election day" (though any Particular polling station wasn't necessarily open all day every day for that whole time period, as the buildings and staff still had to serve their usual purposes as well), and at least in the larger cities there are so many of them that in previous years at all but the busiest, when open only on election day, you were particularly unfortunate if you had to wait for two people to get their ballots ahead of you, (and if you had to wait at all for a booth to vote in after that).
This year anti-COVID precautions actually lead to higher than usual voter turnout, but also longer wait times. Still no more than 5 minutes though.
The process of voting in person is dead easy. Turn up at a polling station. Wait in line if there's a backlog. When its your turn, give your name,and wait while they find and cross it off the list (this goes faster if you bring the easy vote card you get sent in the mail before the election. It's litteraly just a bit of card with your name and a number, and the number mostly just makes finding the right page and line on the list quicker. Cuts down on need to repeat or spell out your name etc, you can vote just fine without it.) If the polling station is not one intended to handle the electorate you should be voting in there's some extra paperwork.
The attendant crosses your name off the list, tears the relevant ballot paper (or papers, if there's a referendum going on, as was the case this time), folds them, marks some stuff on the stub (basically an indication that it was issued properly, and it does not include your name or number ), you go over to the booth (just a cardboard lecturn and privacy screen, basically), unfold and mark your ballot, fold it back up, then walk over to the ballot boxes and stick it in the appropriate box. Then leave.
That's It!
You can also get a form that lets you appoint someone as basically a courier for you, which authorizes them to go to the polling station, collect your ballot papers, bring those papers to you to fill out, then take the filled out papers back to the polling station and put them in the ballot box for you. Not sure exactly how that process works, but given its intended use, it can't be too complicated.
You can also go through a slightly more complicated process to vote (more) early at local government offices, or vote by mail, if you'll be away from your electorate (or flat out out of the country) when the polls are properly open.
If you're in hospital or prison or an old folks home or whatever, the polling station kind of comes to you.
The votes are Entirely anonymous, as the only person who can connect you to your ballot paper (and even then only if they have an unreasonably good memory and Specifically cared about You) has nothing to do with the counting process, so far as I'm aware.
The number of ballots issued can be checked against the number of names crossed off, the specific ballot papers issued can be checked against the ballot papers received, the different polling stations rolls can be checked against each other for duplicate voters... If discrepancies crop up, cops show up and start asking pointed questions, and presumably if said discrepancies could alter the outcome then presumably the electorate's vote gets redone. Don't think it's ever come up.
Early votes are counted on election day, election day votes are counted immediately after the polls close. Provisional results are announced that night. In the past that might have meant the early hours of the next morning, but with all the early votes counted during the day it wrapped up before midnight (and was mostly decided even earlier) this time around.
You then have a couple of weeks during which special (mostly absentee) votes come in, and the count gets rechecked multiple times before the official results are locked in. Usually a one or two seat shift to the left (usually to the Greens at National's expense) in the party vote, only Very rarely changes the result of any electorates, Might affect how much National or Labour need any given coalition partner, but not which of them manages to form a government.
And that's the Election done with.
Note that at no point do you need any ID. Which is good, because the way the law is set up here the electoral commission would have to issue that itself.
Edit: whoops. That got away on me a bit. Didn't mean to make it that big.
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