I Voted

[pebblerocker]

Massive numbers of people have voted in advance this election. Lots of reminders for people to vote NOW over the last fortnight. That includes my brother, who is travelling outside his electorate today. I am vanishingly unlikely to forget to vote and I like the atmosphere of election day. I like walking to the local school and seeing people coming in and out of the polling booth; it's one occasion to walk around my area and feel involved in things.

And I like making my mark with the orange pen and getting my sticker. The first time I voted in a national election I accidentally got some orange ink on my finger in the booth, and since then I've made sure to come away with a bit of orange on me so I really feel like I've done my bit.

Beautiful sunny spring day today, that's good for turnout, and it sounds like the youth vote is up a bit, so there's some hope for progress. We'll see.

Comments

[vilakins]

I'm not sure about a police check and I can't remember what's in the declaration now. Yes, there's training whether you've got experience or not, usually about 2-3 hours to issue ordinary votes, and another couple if you're taking specials (people out of their electorate, people who've moved etc), plus more again if you're a voting place manager. I've done ordinary and special votes, but being a manager is quite involved with all the paperwork at the end of the day; I wouldn't do it. I offered to do advance votes but they had enough people here already, with only one place taking them, and the post-election check and recount is in Alexandra which is ridiculously far away (this is the largest electorate geographically in the country, I think). But if you have a compact electorate, you could go for any of those next time.