"NZ Votes"
In 2005 the Maxim Institute ran a project leading up to the New Zealand general election, 2005 called "NZ Votes." The campaign featured a website and 30 debates between electorate candidates around the country. On its website, the NZ Votes project described itself as a "non profit and non partisan" and as a "community service" designed to inform voters about MMP. However, Nicky Hager criticised the Institute's candidate database in his book The Hollow Men (2006), and also alleged that there had been close ties between the New Zealand National Party and a series of educational policy booklets that attacked New Zealand Labour Party government stances on such issues. However another book, The Baubles of Office, makes a point of highlighting the political neutrality of nzvotes.org.
In June 2011, the Institute advertised that it had invited Iain Duncan-Smith, United Kingdom Secretary of State for Welfare and Pensions, head of the Centre for Social Justice and former leader of the Conservative Party of the United Kingdom and the Opposition (2001—2003). This has raised some questions about whether the Institute's days of social conservative emphasis are as far behind it as its recent public policy statements and analyses suggest. Duncan-Smith is an outspoken social conservative on issues like abortion, civil partnerships and inclusive adoption reform in the United Kingdom
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Famous quotes containing the word votes:
“I must sojourn once to the ballot-box before I die. I hear the ballot-box is a beautiful glass globe, so you can see all the votes as they go in. Now, the first time I vote I’ll see if the woman’s vote looks any different from the rest—if it makes any stir or commotion. If it don’t inside, it need not outside.”
—Sojourner Truth (c. 1797–1883)