New Zealand 2011

[Nichlemn]

Ipredict Markets on 2011 election

National at 80% to win, a ton of other contracts.

[Nichlemn]

National - centre-right. In power as a minority government since 2008, supported by ACT, the Maori Party and United Future. Led by Prime Minister John Key. Key has an agreeable, centrist style which has helped kept his party well ahead of Labour. Last election: 58 seats, 45% of the vote.

Labour - centre-left. Official Opposition. Previously in power from 1999-2008 under Helen Clark, now led by long-time MP Phil Goff, who struggles in personal popularity polls against Key. Running a campaign on the "cost of living", opposing asset sales, supporting removing GST from food and vegetables and introducing a capital gains tax on second properties. Last election: 43 seats, 34% of the vote.

Greens - environmentalist left. Co-led by Metiria Turei and Russel Norman. Last election: 9 seats, 7% of the vote.

ACT - right-wing. Led by Don Brash, leader of National from 2003-2006 (preceding Key). Ostensibly liberal in the European sense, it has in practice tended to appeal to economic conservatives and "law and order" types. Supports the National-led government. Last election: 5 seats, 4% of the vote.

Maori Party - indigenous rights. Co-led by Tariana Turia and Pita Sharples. Supports the National-led government. Last election: 5 seats (now 4 with Hone Harawira's defection), 2% of the vote. (Note: all are reserved "Maori seats").

United Future - centrist. Led by Peter Dunne, a former Labour MP.  Supports the National-led government, however, supported the Labour government from 2002-2008. Last election: 1 seat, 1% of the vote.

Mana Party - leftist offshoot of the Maori Party, led by former Maori Party MP Hone Harawira. Last election: N/A, registered in 2011.

New Zealand First - populist, nationalist. Led by Winston Peters. Out of Parliament, but with a reasonable chance of returning. Last election: 0 seats, 4% of the vote (below 5% threshold).

[Nichlemn]

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Wrong. Most of those problems involved former leader Rodney Hide. Former Auckland mayor John Banks, running in Hide's former seat of Epsom (the wealthiest electorate in the country) with the tacit support of National is very likely to win the seat and keep ACT in Parliament, even if they fail to reach the 5% threshold.

[Nichlemn]

New Zealand is a bit of weird place politically. The NZ Labour Party is a sister party to the Australian Labor Party, Canada's NDP and the British Labour Party - yet they were the ones who brought in a neo-conservative reign of terror in the 90s with their fanatically rightwing Finance Minister Roger Douglas. I think that historically National Party was more rural based so they tended to favour more massive subsidies for farmers and high tariffs etc... Labour became a lot more progressive under Helen Clark - but I think the major parties are a lot closer together in NZ than in other anglo countries.

One thing that mystifies me about politics in NZ is the fact that they still have as much of a two party system as they do - given that they switched to proportional representation quite a few years ago. The conventional wisdom is that the moment you have PR you open the door to the vote splinter every which way with a moderate left party a far left party, a moderate right party a far right party, a green party, religious right party etc...etc...yet in NZ it seems that about 90% of the votes still keep going to the two big parties and there is no sign of small parties getting off the ground. Very odd.

That's only been the case for the last few elections. In 2002, minor parties received nearly 40% of the vote, for instance.

[Nichlemn]

Yes, but its strange that the trend in NZ has been for the small parties to shrink and for things to revert back to a two party system - even though there is no strategic voting or wasted vote reason to suppress smaller parties. Look at all these countries with PR like Israel and the Netherlands etc...that have a plethora of parties and where the biggest party in the country is lucky to get over 25% of the vote.

Israel and the Netherlands have much lower thresholds than New Zealand. New Zealand's parties have been fairly similar to Germany's, who also have a 5% threshold.

[Nichlemn]

One thing that annoys me about NZ political journalism (I'm not so sure about how it works in other countries) is the reporting of single polls as if they're really significant.

[Nichlemn]

Most Recent Poll
Nat - 49.5%
Lab - 28.7%
Green - 12.6%
no other parties meeting the threshold.

First time I can see the Nats below 50% since February...

It's only by .5%. They are still likely to break 50.

No, not particularly. The NZ Intrade gives them only a 43% chance. There's a tendency for opinion polls to overrate the major parties' support (for instance, there were a lot of polls giving National over 50% last time, yet they only got 45%).

[Nichlemn]

It's kind of annoying that the referendum uses FPTP to choose the alternative system, which will probably end up being FPTP precisely because of that.

Most of the (already limited) debate on the referendum appears to be on the first question, which is a shame because "changing the voting system" doesn't exist in a vacuum. Suppose your preferences are STV>MMP>FPP, you'd vote "No" on Q1 if you thought STV was clearly likely to advance, "Yes" if FPP was clearly likely to advance and you'd have to weigh up the pros and cons if both had a reasonable chance of advancing. Also, those who would vote "Yes" on Q1 regardless still have a second vote, and it's not obvious what they should vote for. Do you vote for FPP tactically in the hopes that it will be unlikely to win the run-off? Or is one of the other systems even less likely to win because they're unknown and potentially confusing? What if FPP is only marginally less likely, so you have to trade-off whether getting FPP say 20% of the time is better than say PV 30% of the time?

[Nichlemn]

Anyone interested in doing some maps by polling booths after those results come out? I've been making some Excel spreadsheets of left-right PVIs for each polling booth, mainly in the South Island. I've also toyed with the idea of doing a fantasy redistricting of a Christchurch or Canterbury assembly, based on general election results.

[Nichlemn]

Canterbury is a region in the South Island, including the city of Christchurch (where I live). New Zealand used to have provincial government up until 1876. I think it could be fun to recreate the Canterbury province with new districts.

[Nichlemn]

Um. IC. Why not just divide the Islands?

Could do a South Island assembly, yes. It doesn't really matter what it results in, I just want an excuse to have more granular visual representations of NZ voting patterns, but particularly in Christchurch.

[Nichlemn]

Sure, I'm just most interested in the Christchurch one, not just because I live there but because of its recent earthquakes meaning the voting population will be much lower in some areas.

[Nichlemn]

iPredict (NZ Intrade) projections

National PM - 93.9%
Labour PM - 5.5%

Vote Shares

National 47.0%
Labour 27.7%
Green 11.7%
NZ First 4.6%
ACT 3.1%
Maori 1.1%
United Future 0.6%
Other 3.5%

National >50% of the vote = 41.7% chance
Winston Peters (NZ First) elected to Parliament = 41.7%

Key general electorates (i.e. those that can change the allocation of seats)

Epsom: 56.6% National doesn't win (almost all ACT)
Ohariu: 73.1% United Future

Maori electorates

Hauraki-Waikato: 92.5% Labour, 5% Maori, 4.4% Other
Ikaroa-Rawhiti: 88.8% Labour, 11.2% Maori, 0.2% Other
Tamaki Makaurau: 100% Maori
Te Tai Hauauru Electorate: 92.5% Labour, 7.5% Labour, 1.1% Other
Te Tai Tokerau: 96.8% Mana, 3.0% Labour, 0.4% Maori
Te Tai Tonga: 51.7% Labour, 48.3% Maori, 0.4% Other
Waiariki: 79.1% Maori, 20.9% Other, 2.5% Labour

[Nichlemn]

It's my thirteenth General Election vote (remember we have a three year cycle so I'm not quite as old as you think) and the process still amazes me.I stood with my daughter in a very short line behind two young men with tattoos and piercings and in front of an old lady with a walking stick...I felt very proud to be able to do something that most people in history have not been able to do.

Which means (and I am guesstimating) you are probably in your late 50s -which means your daughter is in her mid-late twenties. 

Well, as long as you're young at heart, it doesn't really matter how old you are on paper .....  

Good deduction...I'm 55 and my daughter is 23.

As a side note my daughter really felt motivated to vote as her boyfriend gave his party vote to ACT and she wanted to make sure she cancelled his vote     if I was her I'd be reviewing the whole relationship

The election gag law prohibits us from saying anything that might affect someone else's vote, including online. You're probably good here being anonymous but it's still risky.

[Nichlemn]

It's my thirteenth General Election vote (remember we have a three year cycle so I'm not quite as old as you think) and the process still amazes me.I stood with my daughter in a very short line behind two young men with tattoos and piercings and in front of an old lady with a walking stick...I felt very proud to be able to do something that most people in history have not been able to do.

Which means (and I am guesstimating) you are probably in your late 50s -which means your daughter is in her mid-late twenties. 

Well, as long as you're young at heart, it doesn't really matter how old you are on paper .....   

Good deduction...I'm 55 and my daughter is 23.

As a side note my daughter really felt motivated to vote as her boyfriend gave his party vote to ACT and she wanted to make sure she cancelled his vote     if I was her I'd be reviewing the whole relationship

The election gag law prohibits us from saying anything that might affect someone else's vote, including online. You're probably good here being anonymous but it's still risky.

Even if he weren't anonymous, I would think that it wouldn't matter if some guy made a comment on an American website.

Facebook and Twitter are American websites, too. Granted, this website's focus is American elections, but it attracts an international audience including NZers, especially in this thread.

[Nichlemn]

John Banks leads in Epsom, however, on current numbers ACT will get 0 list MPs (meaning its leader, Don Brash, would not be elected to Parliament).

[Nichlemn]

I find great amusement in the fact that "Informal Votes" is the leading option in Part-B of the referendum.

That's because many MMP supporters don't want any of the other options so didn't bother voting in Part B.

Seems kind of silly, since MMP's chances in a second referendum would depend on what was nominated.

[Nichlemn]

Have there been boundary changes, btw? If not I can get some maps up pretty quickly.

Nope.

Maps up on NZ Herald.com though.

[Nichlemn]

ACT's leader not getting into Parliament despite his party retaining a presence is a first, certainly under MMP.

[Nichlemn]

If Christchurch Central is a tie, than National does still have a slim chance of getting an outright majority doesn't it?

Electorate seats (barring overhang or parties under 5%, which don't apply in this case) don't matter for a party's numbers.

[Nichlemn]

lolwellingtoncentral

Because Greens nearly beat Labour (and probably will after specials?)

[Nichlemn]

Leading party isn't too interesting as the centre-left bloc is much stronger than Labour's numbers would suggest (as you get weird situations like National sweeping Christchurch and Wellington). The trouble is it's somewhat hard to define the blocs. NZF was ruled out by Key but it can't really be described as "center-left", as split voting statistics from last time (when it was also ruled out) suggest that quite a few of its voters would vote National if it did not exist.

In any case, I'd like to see a trend map from 2008-2011. It's probably worth waiting for special votes though, as it seems that Christchurch has trended right but that might just be due to left-wing voters leaving who will come through in the specials.

[Nichlemn]

If Christchurch Central is a tie, than National does still have a slim chance of getting an outright majority doesn't it?

Electorate seats (barring overhang or parties under 5%, which don't apply in this case) don't matter for a party's numbers.

Why wouldn't a National win there give them 61 seats? I don't understand what you mean by that. They would still have an MP for the electorate, so why wouldn't it be counted?

Because they would lose a list seat to Labour if they win Christchurch Central.
It is the purpose of MPP. %age are determining the numbers of seats, like in PR, but people still have a local MP.

Isn't that somewhat undemocratic though to take away an MP for a party just because an electorate votes one way?

It doesn't take away an MP on net. National would gain one more electorate seat at the cost of losing one list seat, resulting in the party having the same number of seats overall.

[Nichlemn]

Here is an in-depth analysis of the 2008 election's statistics. It does show some significant regional differences, so I wouldn't give up on regional breakdowns.

Edit: though I suppose David Farrar could be expected to do some similar again this year, so maybe it'd be better to try something he won't do.

I'd be intrigued to do some longer term analysis to see if there's any good evidence of regional trends.

[Nichlemn]

Anyways, wrt longer term trends and all that, I made half (but only about half, if that) an attempt at comparing 2011 with 1990 here.

There are probably some serious errors; boundary changes in places have been pretty major, for obvious reasons.

Being a resident of the Port Hills electorate and having studied the results by polling place, I can tell you that boundary changes are most likely to blame here. The northern part of the current electorates contains many very strongly Labour central suburbs, while the Southern part contains a lot of hillside and seaside suburbs that are about evenly divided overall. This can seen in the predecessor electorate to Port Hills, Banks Peninsula (which had fewer of those northern areas and included Banks Peninsula itself) was a Labour marginal in the marginally Labour year of 2005, and won by National in 1996.