More than 100,000 New Zealanders living abroad have enrolled to vote in the country's November general election, and many are dissatisfied with the centre-right coalition government, potentially shaping a tightly contested vote.
Kris Taute, a Māori New Zealander who has lived in Sydney for 15 years, says he is concerned by poverty, inequality and recent changes to Māori policy at home. "I see a lot of poverty among families and friends, and inequality … stuff that needs to be addressed," he told the Guardian. He says the government's removal of "quite a lot of Māori rights" troubles him deeply and is why he is more motivated to vote this time.
Record overseas enrolments
Stats NZ estimates about one million New Zealanders live overseas. Offshore voter enrolments currently stand at 104,164, up 60% compared with the same point in the 2023 election cycle, according to the latest electoral commission data. The commission told the Guardian this is the "highest number" of enrolments it has seen in recent elections.
New Zealand's overseas votes form part of a larger group called "special votes," which typically favour leftwing minor parties, says Lara Greaves, a political scientist at Victoria University of Wellington. In 2023, special votes resulted in Te Pāti Māori and the Greens gaining three seats between them.
Minor parties as kingmakers
"If I had to guess where the overseas vote would go this election … it will go to the minor parties, because they are all offering alternative visions for New Zealand," Greaves says, adding "a lot of them" would be left-leaning. "That's been the conventional wisdom and I can see an argument for that this time around," she says.
The latest 1News Verian poll shows support for the two major parties at 28% each, and the Greens surging to their highest ever result of 16%. Other minor parties are polling above the 5% threshold needed to enter parliament under New Zealand's mixed member proportional (MMP) system. If major parties do not get enough votes to form a government, minor parties can become "kingmakers," with the power to decide who governs.
Tracey Lee runs Every Kiwi Vote Counts, a non-partisan initiative to encourage overseas voting. With the polls so close, Lee believes overseas votes can "legitimately have an impact" and "a fraction of a percentage point can become a decider," she says. In a sign of the bloc's importance, leaders of prominent political parties will speak to offshore New Zealanders directly in a virtual town hall next month – a first for the country.
Record exodus to Australia
Australia is home to the biggest NZ diaspora, and numbers have surged as NZ experienced record high departures, many escaping a weak labour market, sluggish economy and high living costs. About 74,000 chose to move to Australia since the 2023 election, adding to the roughly 600,000 New Zealanders already there.
Some left because it seemed to be "the only option available to them to find work and experience," Lee says. "They'd love to come home and voting is a way to ensure they're part of making it a place they can come home to." Greaves says there is a disgruntled bloc of voters who left because they could not see a future for themselves: "There is a possibility that a good chunk of that bigger group that have now moved overseas are quite oppositional or quite opposed to what the government has been doing and do feel a level of spite."
Australian-based voters told the Guardian of their desire to retain their voice in New Zealand's election – either to help their families, or to shape the country for their possible return. Onkar Singh, who has lived in Melbourne for more than 20 years, has no plans to return but wants to keep the option open; he did not wish to disclose who he would vote for but said members of his New Zealand-Punjabi community "were happy with the current government." Most of those the Guardian spoke with, however, would be voting for change. For Melbourne-based lawyer Joseph Nunweek, a move back is likely; despite living in Australia since 2014, he feels a responsibility to vote for policies that would support his family and community back home, particularly in healthcare, renewable energy and foreign policy. "Washing your hands of [the election] is not really an option," he says.
Lee argues the "mega-electorate" living abroad should no longer be ignored: "We've had the right to vote [overseas] since 1956, but it's slightly frowned upon: 'you left, it's not your business' is the unwritten rule. But … democracy only works if we are all part of it."
