New Zealand asset sales

New Zealand asset sales referendum, 2013
"Do you support the Government selling up to 49 per cent of Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power, Genesis Power, Solid Energy and Air New Zealand?"
Results Votes  % Yes 442,985 7001324000000000000♠32.40% No 920,188 7001673000000000000♠67.30% Informal votes 4,167 6999300000000000000♠0.30% Valid votes 1,367,340 7001998800000000000♠99.88% Invalid or blank votes 1,585 6999120000000000000♠0.12% Total votes 1,368,925 100.00% Registered voters/turnout 3,037,405 7001450700000000000♠45.07%
Source: Electoral Commission

The 2013 New Zealand asset sales referendum is a citizens-initiated referendum that took place by postal ballot from 22 November 2013 to 13 December 2013. It was on the Fifth National (Key) government's policy to partially privatise four energy-related state-owned enterprises and reducing the government's share in Air New Zealand.

In March 2013, the groups collecting signatures to force the referendum announced that they had achieved enough signatures to comfortably clear the 10% registered voters threshold. However, in May 2013, the clerk of the house announced that the petition was 16,500 signatures short of the number required (308,753), as about 100,000 signatures on the petition were faulty or invalid. The organisers had a further two months to obtain the extra signatures. In September 2013, it was officially confirmed that the added signatures had successfully been collected, with the tally now standing some 18,500 more signatures than required.

The referendum was backed by several prominent New Zealanders, including Dame Anne Salmond, who called it the "only just way" to determine whether asset sales are acceptable.

On 30 September 2013, Prime Minister John Key announced that the referendum would be via postal ballot and would take place between 22 November and 13 December. The cost of the referendum would be $NZD9 million.

John Key said that the Government intended to ignore the results of the referendum, as the 2011 general election gave them a mandate for the sell-off.

The question asked was:

"Do you support the Government selling up to 49% of Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power, Genesis Power, Solid Energy and Air New Zealand?"

The National government was re-elected at the 2011 election on a platform of "Mixed Ownership Model" for the five state-owned companies Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power, Genesis Energy, Solid Energy and Air New Zealand, where a minority stake in the companies would be sold off. This policy was opposed by the opposition. A coalition of groups including the Green Party, Grey Power, Council of Trade Unions (CTU), Labour Party, New Zealand Union of Students' Associations (NZUSA), Greenpeace and others started a petition against it in April 2012.The New Zealand Herald argued in an editorial that the Green Party used parliamentary funding to pay people to collect signatures, which while legal broke a long-standing convention about citizen initiated referenda.

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