LIVE THREAD - New Zealand General Election

September 17, 2005 | Heatseeker

[Heatseeker]

Thought I would start a thread on the New Zealand general election - returns starting to come in now.

Non-NZ FReepers can try the live streams of Channel One News, http://tvnz.co.nz/view/news_minisite_index_skin/news_election_2005_group

or 3 News, http://www.tv3.co.nz/listings/index.cfm

[moose2004]

Sam Neil must be crying.

[RDTF]

Wonder if that plane crash scrolling across Fox is related? Something about a hijacked plane that crashed into a building?

[RDTF]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1486287/posts#comment?q=1

[Heartofsong83]

IIRC, these would be the US equivalents:

National = Republican
Labor = Democratic

ACT = Libertarian
United Future = Constitution
Green = Green
Progressives = socialist
NZ First = independent Pat Buchanan/Reform
Maori = special interest

[montag813]

When Helen goes down, will she blame the JOOOOOS?

[BlessedBeGod]

Thanks for the report. That sounds very positive! I'm from the Chicago suburbs, so I can relate to your comparison very well. ;-)

Good luck!

[Forgiven_Sinner]

Thanks for the report. I root for conservative candidates from around the world. The only cure for poverty is free enterprise. This quote:

"There's definitely a philosophical split between what's in it for me and what's in it for the country,"

from your report indicates a socialist mind set--that the benefit of the individual takes away from the benefit of the country. It's actually the other way around. A simple question is: who will spend money more wisely, the government or the individual? The answer is self evident. If there is any remaining doubt about government wisdom over the individual, examine the glorious history of the Soviet Union's extreme efficiency.

[Issaquahking]

Thanks for keeping America abreast in what is happening in New Zealand! Will be great if NZ comes up with conservative leadership.


BUMP for NEW ZEALAND!

[GEC]

Any updates?

[MEG33]

http://www.electionresults.govt.nz/partystatus.html

[Uriah_lost]

How is this shaking out? Who is going to put a coalition together first? What compromises will have to be made? Inquiring minds want to know....

[NZerFromHK]

I posted this on Freedominion.ca. It should be a useful starting point: :)

---

We currently have 122 members in Parliament according to the election results last night. Labour is in the lead with 50 seats, National 49, United Future 3, ACT 2, Progressives 1, Greens 6, Maori 4, New Zealand First 6.

Labour, Greens, and the Progressives are obviously on the Left and they get 57 seats in Parliament. If they add Maori to the lot they are squarely at the half mark at 61. They can form a minority government but won't be able to pass legislations that really matter. National and ACT combined form the Right and they get 51 seats. United Future helped Labour last time but they will not support any government with the Green Party MPs as cabinet ministers. If they get together and have New Zealand First's support they also have 61 seats - able to form a minority government likewise.

New Zealand First's governance has a lot of Pat Buchanan paleoconservatism and populism in it. It may support Labour on a confidence and supply fashion but bear in mind it is poles apart from the Green Party so there will be some critical social and foreign affairs stance that Labour's Left go with Green support, but will be opposed by the New Zealand First. In other words even if Labour wins this time it will be a lame duck for this term - the Left can't pass anything important without centrists and even paleoconservatives' support.

To complicate matters we still have 193,000 special votes to be counted. Labour only leads National by 20,000 overall. And according to the current electoral laws the Green Party had not won any electoral seats so to represent in Parliament they have to pass off the 5% threshold which they have done barely, at 5.1%. If these special votes show a dismal performance by the Green Party, the overall share of Green Party votes could go down to 4.9% and Labour's chance of governance would be toast because the Greens are gone. And National and ACT could receive a lot of votes and tilt the balance towards the Right.

---

A blog has good information on the results:

Election postmortem

[Uriah_lost]

Thank you! That's just what I was looking for.

[Archie Bunker on steroids]

Whoever wins better pass an immediate law to ensure that the Steinlager recipe is to remain unchanged forever.

[NZerFromHK]

The problem with New Zealand is that we are not only full of welfare benefitaries and ethnic special interests groups, but more fatally we are also full of well off (ethnically Euroepan) people who stubbornly believe intellectual leftism works. They are like the "feel good limousine liberals" or we call them chardonnay socialists back here. One example is this young lady living in central Auckland:

---

http://mariavontrapp.blogspot.com/2005/09/on-politics.html

"I split my vote between the Greens and National. Very odd (especially as the last two times I've given two ticks to Labour), but there is method behind my madness:

* I actually quite like the Greens as I've become more of a leftie lately. The Greens are the only party who look at sustainability and a future that is more than 5 years away.
* In order for Labour to govern, they will need the Greens in some way, shape or form, so I felt it was critical for them to get 5%. If they failed to reach 5% then that would be wasted vote, and that would actually help the right - not something I wanted to see happen.
* The National vote is a bit harder to explain. I'm no longer a fan of Judith Tizard, and so I thought to myself "which electorate candidate deserves my vote the most?" The answer to that was relatively easy: Pansy Wong is articulate, hard working, and nice. She deserves to be in Parliament. She is also an Asian voice, and given the ever changing face of Auckland, I think it's important the Asian voice is heard in Parliament.
* Also, I knew that JT would rock on home, but wanted to send a message by slashing her majority. This did happen (I've been an uber geek, done the figures, and discovered that her majority slipped by a whopping 36%), although it looks like Wong picked off some votes from the ACT and Labour candidates, and then JT picked up some from Nandor."

---

God help us, because this is the types that in America that fill in places like the New York Times editorial board, Harvard University professors, Boston Chambers of Commerce, Hollywood celebrities, Seattle NGOs, and give us Michael Moore, Barbara Boxer, Dick Durbin.

[NZerFromHK]

In fact I need to stress that it is not necessarily New Zealand's right will support the US on WOT. There are some people who are schipozerpic: pro-free trade, pro-welfare reform, and perhaps even pro-family, but squarely anti-American on WOT and wimpy on defence. One ACT supporter (now living in America) says something like this:

---

http://www.rodneyhide.com/index.php/weblog/comments/sunday_papers/

(read the comments section)

"#

good job maurice, sara, michael and everyone else so involved in rodney’s epsom push. i was a little nervous looking it up today.

i’m in america now though, and the war on iraq is looking more and more stupid every day. can we quit it please, at least don’t support it.

ps. do we really need nuclear? i don’t think so. i’m not a scientist but our population demands arent’ that big and I’d rather protect our remote island virginity from the ghoully glow of nuclear waste.

bring on the efficient, creative economy which will flourish in NZ with a leaner, less bureaucratic government.

GO ACT
Posted by charlotte on 09/18 at 03:00 PM"

---

So my advice is that: remember the three-legged stool of American conservatism is not necessarily present in New Zealand. Particularly on the foreign/defence policy wise.

[BFPRufus]

IMO we lost.

Labour+Green+Maori+Progressive = 61 seats, and with NZF and UF guaranteeing supply they'll be able to form a government. Then appoint someone from National as house speaker, which means they only vote to break ties (similar to US VP). That would leave the laft coalition with 61/121 votes, and not needing NZF or UF in government. Labour had already worked with the Greens and Progressive, it's just a matter of keeping 1 more special interest group happy.


On the right, National would work with ACT. If it meant getting into government they'd also work with the more cetnrist United Future, but New Zealand First has siad they won't form a coalition government with anyone, and the rest of the parties are anti-National (green is far left, National promised to abolish the racially based Maori seats and sets a limit on Treaty of Waitangi claims, Progressive is also far-left).


So overall, we lost on election night. Helen's back as PM. The only thing that could stop her is the special votes, but from what they were saying on the night they go more left than the non-specials.

[WOSG]

Sounds like a conservative, but one who has been fooled by the mis-information on Nukes, the GWOT, etc.

One reason to fear media bias. Fool 10% of the people that way and you have enough to swing elections.

[WOSG]

Interesting, this "hung" Parliament result looks alot like what happened in germany...

and USA in Gore v Bush ... was America the trendsetter here?

[BFPRufus]

New Zealand had a fairly similar result in 1993 - National 49, Labout 46, NZF2, Alliance 2.
National and NZF formed a coalition of 51-48, with a member of Labour being voted in as Speaker to make it 51-47 This was the first coalition required in decades.

Since then New Zealand has changed to a German-style MMP system where the makeup of PArliament is based on the % of party vote rather than winning electorates. This makes it much earier for fringe groups (like to Greens) to get in - since MMP came in in 1996 there has not been a single-party victory.