After six years as a cherished mokopuna bedfellow, she had lost all limbs, one ear and most of her face. These weren’t wounds; they were the map of a shared history.
As I sewed her a new form, I listened as person after person came in to the library to post their local body votes, playing their part in shaping our community.
But they couldn’t. The ballot boxes had been taken from the library the day before voting closed.
Everyone who came in knew the votes were due by noon on Saturday. They didn’t know the boxes would be removed from Dunedin’s local areas on the Friday.
It was ridiculous. And scandalous.
It turns out the notice about the early removal was written in the small print on the council-provided information. That information was ineffective and, if it had been in a contract, unenforceable.
Instead, people were racing into town. And, in classic Waitati-community form, town-goers were coming into the library offering to take people’s voting papers in for them. Here was a flawed system being mended, wonkily but effectively, by community spirit.
In the face of laments about low local body turnout, my morning showed how arbitrary rules can powerfully impact voters’ rights. I’m sure someone thought taking the boxes early would help with counting.
But the franchise matters more than expediency. The votes were going to be counted all week. Leaving the boxes until Saturday at noon would have caused no harm to the electoral process.
We cannot know how many people were disenfranchised by this one decision to remove ballot boxes early. The decision needs to form part of a significant review of the Dunedin City Council voting system to ensure every part of it is clear and simple and supports voters’ rights.
Growth is not only forward, it requires us to acknowledge what is broken and commit to fixing it.
In the meantime, congratulations to everyone who stood for election, and to those elected to our councils and committees. And yes, congratulate voters too, for engaging in the process of change.
Standing for political office is increasingly fraught. Everyone who does so takes a personal risk.
Public life is consuming. Public figures are judged harshly and treated roughly. Their families lose out to public needs, their privacy is sacrificed and everything becomes open to scrutiny. You become a target.
We saw the effects this week, with one elected councillor in Central Otago stepping down just days after being elected. It’s a wonder so many people put their hands up when the impact of winning can be so hard.
But it is a service, so a huge mihi to all who stood and to those who served in the last term for their contribution. This, too, is part of the difficult, personal change that public life demands.
I am particularly pleased that Dunedin has a female mayor. It’s only the second time in Dunedin’s history and is long overdue. It is also great that both the mayor and deputy-mayor are women, although I am reluctant to even mention it — two women in these leadership roles should not be an exception to the norm.
But this is an important moment in our local political landscape and it is good to acknowledge it.
In other news, I am delighted that the Dunedin Readers and Writers Festival begins today. After a long winter, this festival is a great way to celebrate our springtime.
There are so many events to suit all tastes and inclinations, including a fabulous day for tamariki at the new South Dunedin library. I have the privilege of talking with Nadine Hura about her beautiful book, Slowing the Sun, on Saturday.
Beyond the fun, the festival makes a more serious contribution to our city. I don’t mean to our economy, although that is also important.
This festival gives us a unique opportunity in these trying times to engage with each other and with new ideas ā-tinana — in-person. Too much of our interaction is controlled by our screens, moderated by social media. Algorithms repeat back to us only what we think we know, trapping us in a feedback loop that narrows our ideas and makes us less tolerant and less generous.
The Dunedin Readers and Writers Festival is an opportunity to reconnect, converse, challenge and explore new ideas and perspectives that will literally expand our minds. It is a catalyst for intentional change.
We all struggle with the cost of living, global conflicts, climate instability, hostile domestic politics and relentless misinformation. Here is a small but delicious window we can open into conversations that will help spring-clean our minds and invite new connections.
I finished repairing Hoppity. She looks different now, a little wonky. My moko declared, after asking for purple eyebrows, that "she’s not perfect".
And no, she is not. But she is whole again in a new way.
Time is a rascally burglar, for people and Hoppitys alike, but she is here still, partly old, partly new.
Everything changes, not by discarding the old, but by weaving it into the new. That’s life, right?
■ Metiria Stanton Turei is a senior law lecturer at the University of Otago and a former Green Party MP and co-leader.
