With the 2023 New Zealand Election just weeks away, the time to make an informed decision about who to vote for is getting shorter.

Re: News Head of Content, Anna Harcourt, will be one of the hosts of the TVNZ Young Voters’ Debate. And she wants to help you to navigate all the policies and promises being made by the political parties.

Anna has spoken to Billie about how young Kiwis can best educate themselves before heading to the polls on October 14th.

Tell us a little about yourself?

I’m the head of content for Re: News, which is TVNZ’s online news and current affairs platform for younger audiences. The head of content role means I help oversee our team of journalists, particularly the video and documentary side of things.

I started working at TVNZ seven years ago, in the junior position in the 1News Wellington office, and then I was part of the team who started Re: News. A lot of my friends really cared about the world or about news and current events but just weren’t engaging with other forms of media so I felt it was really important to create useful news and current affairs content that was in a tone and format that resonated with younger audiences, and was where they already were: on social media. And that’s the driving force behind Re: News.

What has your role been like in the coverage of this year's election?

I started a TikTok series called Politics in 60 Seconds where I explain different political parties’ policies in 60 Seconds, and I’m also one of the co-hosts of the TVNZ Young Voters’ Debate, which will be streaming live on Monday 25 September on TVNZ+, 1news.co.nz website and the @renewsnz TikTok and Instagram, and you can also catch up on it on TVNZ+ later if you miss it, it’ll be available to watch there until the election.

When covering the election and informing the public about various parties/policies, do you struggle to keep your personal bias out? How do you go about doing this?

I just try to think of myself as being responsible for putting useful information out there, and it’s up to voters to make up their mind. Young voters are smart enough to make their own decisions, and it’s my job to provide info that people can use as a research tool to help inform those decisions.

Currently, 18-24 year olds have the smallest percentage of enrolments to vote at about 65%, why is it so important that this percentage increases and that we exercise our right to vote?

At the last election, 25% of eligible voters under the age of 35 didn’t vote.

That’s one in four who didn’t vote. Compare that to people over 65: only around one in 10 didn’t vote. We’re the ones who will have to live with the consequences of the decisions that politicians make, so it’s really important that we play a role.

Your ‘Politics in 60 Seconds’ videos have been a vital tool in informing young people about the election and about policy. Why do you think Gen-Z voters are so important and being so heavily targeted in this election?

Gen-Z are a really connected and passionate generation – things like School Strike for Climate really showed that. I think political parties are definitely recognising that it’s important to take young voters seriously.

What are your thoughts on the crucial role social media appears to be playing in this election?

Social media isn’t just an entertainment platform or a place you go to see photos of your friends and family – it’s where most young people are getting their news, getting informed about the world and educating themselves. 40% of Gen Z use TikTok and Instagram instead of Google to search, so it has to be taken seriously.

Do you feel that parties not using social media platforms in their campaign are at a disadvantage? Why?

Definitely, it’s a key place for political parties to reach regular people and to get their campaign messages or ideas out there – we all spend so much time on our phones, so it’s like the modern version of the town square, where you hear all the latest about what’s going on.

With the significant use of social media comes the problem of misinformation. What role do you see this playing in the election and the ongoing campaigns?

Misinformation is a huge problem, and we really saw the huge surge in misinformation around the Covid pandemic. There’s a lot of people who have really gone down a rabbit hole of misinformation and that has affected how they see politicians or political parties.

How can young voters, fully immersed in a digital age, avoid misinformation surrounding the election? How can they determine what is true and fake on social media?

I think it’s really important to be able to know where someone got their information from, what their sources are.

That why in the media we always try and make sure we let you know the source of where we got our information from – we’ll always link directly to the research in our articles, or name the academic or the person who told us something.

When you see someone speaking online about something, a key thing is looking at the sources of where they got their information from. When someone says a vague statement like “they’re lying to you”, interrogate them on what they mean – who is lying to you? About what? Do they have a specific name of the person who told them this, and is that person credible?

For everything I put in my Politics in 60 Seconds series, it’s 100% based directly on what the parties either have written in their policy documents, or what they’ve said themselves – so that a viewer can google the policy announcement and see it right there for themselves.

As a journalist, how do you personally deal with disinformation or fake news?

I look for what the source is – if I feel unsure about something, I’ll google it to double check – is there an official policy document to back it up? Is there evidence that this is something that someone has actually said, and has it been attributed to a real person? Or is it just a vague anonymous statement?

What would be your top tips for any new voters or young people who don’t know where to start with the upcoming election?

I honestly think it can feel really overwhelming as a younger voter because you feel like there’s this mountain of information and you don’t even know where to start – but honestly you don’t have to be perfect, you don’t have to feel like you’re the world’s most highly-researched policy nerd – if you just start with learning a couple of things, then you’re better informed than you were the day before, and that’s what matters. Also, to plug myself, you can watch the Politics in 60 Seconds series on TikTok, or the Young Voters’ Debate, which is like a one-hour crash course on what the six main parties are going to do for young people.

TVNZ’s Young Voters’ Debate is available to view on TVNZ+