Thursday, March 28, 2024

FROM THE RIDGE: Five weeks is a long time in politics

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If all had gone to plan, we would have had an election at the end of this week. But the pandemic put paid to the best-laid plans and the election is now still five weeks away as politicians frantically work the hustings.
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They – and we – will all be exhausted by the time the event eventually happens.

Given the spending promises by all parties just last week alone, in five weeks we will need to sell off Auckland and the South Island to cover the bill.

Last week our radio station, Central FM had a ring to see if Judith Collins could call in and make an appearance on my show, The Cockies Hour.

Naturally, we were delighted to be in such demand and said of course, she’d be most welcome.

That morning I got a message from her team to say she was going to be very busy as she whistled through Waipukurau and it would be on the phone instead.

My business partner had given up his weekend to finish off moving to a new location, giving the new premises a deep clean and even bought her book to be signed.

Given Donald’s crestfallen sobs at this new development, I told Judith’s team the interview was in the flesh or we wouldn’t bother.

I figured a mild dose of blackmail would get Donald’s book signed.

They were unenthusiastic at this offer, so we decided to see what would eventuate.

With just 10 minutes of the show left and no sign of Collins, I was about to play all seven glorious minutes of Hey Jude, complete with the nearly five minutes of na, na, na, nas when Judith rang us.

Front desk asked if I wanted to do the interview, I folded on the in the flesh requirement and we had a pleasant chat on air.

I did ask her that given Simon Bridges had been in town the week before and now her, they must believe that the once safe National seat of Wairarapa was at risk of changing hands.

Not surprisingly, given the last two MPs they’ve dished up to us, Alastair Scott and John Hayes have been underwhelming representatives.

However, this time they have put up farmer Mike Butterick who is a distinct improvement and appears very personable.

He’s up against Kieran McAnulty, a Labour list MP who is also a nice chap and who will be contesting the seat for the third time. He’s worked hard and got the majority down to 3000 last time, which would usually be enough of a buffer, but this is a seat worth keeping an eye on come October 17.

This campaign will obviously be dominated by covid-19 and what we do to repair the economic damage it is wreaking and will continue to wreak.

What is good is that none of the main parties are arguing that the current eradication policy is a bad idea, and everyone agrees that borrowing and spending our way out of this economic crisis is the way to go.

Where to spend that money and what to do to try and pay it back one day are and should be the areas for debate.

I’ve been thinking that this might be the first election where the wasted vote could come into play big time. I hesitate to use that term as every vote is important so should probably say, the party votes that fall under 5% and where the party doesn’t gain at least one electorate MP.

A couple of weeks ago, James Shaw of the Greens shot his party in the foot big time. His advocating and support of $11.7 million dollars of taxpayer money for a wacky private school, called The Green School, made him no friends. He even alienated his own party, given their distaste of public funding for private schools.

For a party hovering close to the 5% threshold, a misstep like this could contribute them to falling below that threshold.

If they are over, then we will almost certainly see a Labour/Green government formed.

Let’s say they fail to cross that threshold and end up on 4%. NZ First are also in serious trouble and many pundits in the past have predicted their demise only to be proven wrong. But for this scenario, let’s award them 4% with not a chance of winning in Northland.

Then you have all the minor parties who have no hope of getting into Parliament like Advance NZ (the most crackpot), Vision NZ (a close second), Opportunities, New Conservative, Outdoors, Social Credit and seven others. Let’s award them a generous combined 4%.

This potential 12% doesn’t get reallocated proportionally to the parties that do get into parliament, but the effect is much the same. This 12% is disregarded when allocating seats in Parliament.

The only remaining parties under this scenario would be Labour, National and Act. Their share of the seats in Parliament will be based upon their percentage share of the vote of the ‘effective vote’ which is the 88% of their combined vote.

Hence Labour on 45% would get over half the seats in Parliament and thus form a government on their own.

However, if they poll in the low 40s, National and Act could pull a rabbit out of the hat and form the next government.

Of course, five weeks is a long time in politics, and anything could happen.

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