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Mike Hosking: Electorate polls shows MMP is done after 20 years

Author
Mike Hosking,
Publish Date
Mon, 21 Sep 2020, 5:01PM
If Chloe Swarbrick can't win Auckland Central, does that mean the Greens are out? (Photo / NZ Herald)
If Chloe Swarbrick can't win Auckland Central, does that mean the Greens are out? (Photo / NZ Herald)

Mike Hosking: Electorate polls shows MMP is done after 20 years

Author
Mike Hosking,
Publish Date
Mon, 21 Sep 2020, 5:01PM

A couple of interesting things to come out of the weekend’s poll on the Auckland Central electorate.

The first, the slightly less interesting bit is 20 percent are undecided. That means the final race will be tighter than it currently is.

The high undecided number is because the incumbent Nikki Kaye is going and people will be working out whether her national replacement is up to much.

It’s been of late a tight run race and this time will be no different.

The second and much more interesting bit is that Chloe Swarbrick won’t win it.

Coming third already, she will stay third, and as a result, if the Greens need her to win, it’s over.

The only other seat of any great interest - remembering of course MMP is about percentage of the vote; with few exceptions, very few individual races count for anything – was Northland.

But a poll some weeks back indicating Shane Jones was coming nowhere sort of put that to bed.

Which is what made Friday's coverage of the Wairarapa seat kind of strange. It’s almost as though the media haven’t quite worked out how MMP works.

Whether Labour or National win Wairarapa doesn’t matter to the parliament. It matters to parties for bragging rights but it doesn’t change the makeup of government. So, why cover it?

Of course, Epsom is a separate kettle of fish, with it being the only seat left with a special arrangement. David Seymour will once again win it, and potentially given the coat tailing rules, drag some more MPs in without crossing the five per cent threshold.

Having said that, with the tail wind he appears to have, I am sure he’s looking for a plus-five number next month.

Anyway back to Auckland Central. Chloe is not the Greens saviour, so it’s up to the Greens to put the Shaw Green School debacle behind them and hope like hell the history of underperforming on the night compared to pre-election polling doesn’t come true. Because if it does, they’re gone.

And if that happens, one of the potential talking points out of that is it will be entirely possible that, Act aside, we will be electing a FPP parliament – just two major parties – just like the good old days.

We wanted MMP, but 20 odd years, on we are voting it out.

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