ORC scraps voting system poll

The Otago Regional Council has abandoned plans to ask Otago residents whether they want a change to how councillors are elected.

Cr Kate Wilson, who first pushed for a poll to consider keeping or scrapping the first-past-the-post voting system the council uses, said recent conversations at a meeting with officials conducting a local government review under way had made it clear the poll could soon be irrelevant.

Yesterday, Cr Wilson called upon councillors to rescind their 2020 decision to hold the poll.

Because the local government review might well prescribe one voting system for all New Zealand, she believed the $70,000 expense for the poll should be saved for annual plan budgeting.

The poll was to be a part of the October elections and would have taken effect in 2025.

"It will be moot, it will be taken off our hands by 2025," Cr Wilson said.

The vote was unanimous.