National list MP Maureen Pugh arriving at Parliament Photo: RNZ / Jane Patterson
The election proper may be over, but with nearly 20 percent of the vote yet to come in there’s still plenty of scope for more parliamentary permutations.
On today’s episode of The Detail, Emile Donovan speaks to Newsroom political editor Sam Sachdeva about why it takes so long to get a final vote count, which electorate seats are still up for grabs, and whether the large swath of vote yet to come in could substantially affect the makeup of the next parliamentary term.
There are few MPs more familiar with the power of the special vote than National’s Maureen Pugh – the self-described “yo-yo MP”.
In both 2014 and 2017, Pugh made it into parliament on the National Party list, only to lose her seat a couple of weeks later when the special vote came in.
Now, ranked 19 on the list, Pugh seems certain to once again miss out when the specials are tallied and announced on Friday.
“I thought this might’ve been third time lucky”, she told Lisa Owen – showing admirable perspicacity.
“I’ve been here before. It’s just the nature of the beast.
“I’m almost assured I’ll be out … I’m just never sure how long that’s for.”
One of the many curiosities of the special vote is that it tends, overwhelmingly, to skew left.
“I think that’s because of the types of people who are likely to be living overseas, or who’ll be voting outside their normal electorate, or might not be organised enough to enrol before writ day”, says Newsroom.co.nz political editor Sam Sachdeva.
The special votes contributed significantly to Labour taking the reins in 2017.
Despite much hankering to make a call on who NZ First would go with, then-kingmaker – or, as it proved, queenmaker – Winston Peters insisted on waiting for the specials to be tallied before making his selection.
When the count came in, National lost two seats to the Labour/Green left bloc – making it a much more viable coalition party.
“It’s not quite as close this time around”, Sachdeva says.
“I don’t think we’ll have that sort of manoeuvring. But it can move numbers around.”
Of course, there aren’t just implications for list MPs – eight electorate sets were won on election night by fewer than 1,000 votes, and could easily change hands: Auckland Central; Invercargill; Maungakiekie; Northland; Tukituki; Whangārei; Tāmaki Makaurau; and Waiariki.
Sachdeva says Whangārei, currently held by National health spokesperson Shane Reti, is the most likely to flip – but he says the most intriguing sub-plot is in Waiariki, where the Māori Party’s co-leader Rawiri Waititi sits 415 votes ahead of the incumbent Tāmati Coffey.
“There is a chance for the Māori Party that if they did well enough in the party vote, they could bring in Debbie Ngarewa-Packer as well.”
On the other hand, if Coffey overtakes Waititi, the Māori Party would be out of parliament altogether.
Big implications – and an anxious wait for the candidates.
This written piece is just a taster – for the full story, listen to the podcast above.
