Swarbrick accuses Luxon of lying about enrolment changes

Greens co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick has accused Christopher Luxon of lying about changes to enrolment law, saying the government knowingly indulged in voter suppression. Speaking to Morning Report's John Campbell, Swarbrick said: "Lie is the truth, I am calling a spade a spade here." The comments were reported by RNZ.

The government changed electoral law to remove the ability to enrol on election day and during the advance voting period. For this election, the enrolment deadline was 25 October. Enrolments closed on Sunday, 13 days before polling day.

Luxon defended the changes. He said they had been announced about a year earlier and that people had plenty of time to enrol. He also said New Zealand's approach was no different to that of Australia, the United Kingdom, Ireland and France.

Luxon said the rule change was partly aimed at preventing increases in the time the Electoral Commission takes to formally count votes. Special votes took three weeks to count after the 2023 election, and are expected to take three weeks again this year.

Before the election, Luxon said he expected enrolment rates this year to be higher than in previous elections, despite the rule changes. The provisional enrolment rate was 93.6 percent of the eligible population, down from 94.7 percent in 2023, according to RNZ.

Labour promised during the election campaign to reverse the enrolment changes. The Greens have called on the government to immediately rule out any consideration of ending same-day enrolment and voting.

Swarbrick has said accessible elections are critical to a functional, inclusive democracy, and that any imposed barrier to elections is open to serious criticism of voter suppression. Earlier, she said she was "worried" the law change ending election-day enrolment could affect the outcome of the election. In a separate comment, she said the overhang strategy and the changes to enrolment laws showed "the system has been gamed."

In April 2025, the government announced that it had accepted a number of recommendations on election processes ahead of the 2026 election. It said the election would be more efficient, resilient and transparent.