THE SOLDIERS' VOTE.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 March 1919, Page 6

THE SOLDIERS' VOTE.

HOW IT IS SAFEGUARDED. The Electoral and Defence Departments have been in consultation with a view to providing full facilities for soldiers who wish to record their votes in the forthcoming licensing poll. So far as soldiers under hospital treatment are concerned, they are not discharged, and will therefore be entitled to vote tinder the provisions of the Licensing Amendment Act, 1918. Arrangements are to be made for polling booths at the hospitals and other institutions for the use of the soldiers who cannot poll at tho ordinary booths. Soldiers who receive their discharge before March 6th, when the rolls close, will not be entitled to vote in the forthcoming election unless they have become registered electors, and have their names on the roll. The fact that a soldier has been absent from New Zealand on military service will not disqualify him from registration because of non-residence, so that he may apply for enrolment in the electorate in which he formerly resided if he is not able to comply with the month's residential qualification in any other electorate. If he is living in a fresh electorate lie can enrol through the post in his old electorate and vote in his own district, or in any district by means of the absent voters' permit. Soldiers who are now being discharged will be handed a claim for enrolment to enable them to register for the district in which they resided prior to their departure from New Zealand. Soldiers who land in New Zealand between March 3rd and .March 14th will have their leave' before discharge extended till Aprill llth, ho as to bring them under the provisions of the Expe° ditionary Forces Voting Aci, enabling them to vote as soldiers! If they arrive on or after March 14th, the usual leave prior to discharge will enable them to lie covered by the same act, and to vote as soldiers. Special arrangements are being made to enrol soldiers us they arrive on the transports. MAORI SOLDIERS. The position is different in connection with Maori soldiers who are returning. The licensing poll has always been taken on the day of the general election for Kuropean members of Pariamont, and by ballot on a special voting paper. Maori elections are not necessarily held on the same day as the European elections, arid the Maori does not vote by. bullot. Another point of difference is that the Maori electorates are not the same as the European constituencies. Therefore, Maoris have never voted in licensing elections, and there was no special reason for bringing the Maori vote into the determination of the special licensing poll on a question on which tliey had never previously been authorised to exercise the franchise. But Maoris who have not been discharged from the Exepeditionary Force on April 10th will, as soldiers, be entitled to vote. 1 If they have been discharged on that date, they will cease to have a special qualification, and will be included in a body to whom the determination of the licensing issue has never been entrusted by Parliament.