The Other Side

As the excitement of Election Day continues to dissipate ever-further, we are confronted with the task of taking stock in light of the results released on Saturday night. That window of a few hours in which the vote counts were flowing in certainly provided those interested with a breathtaking roller coaster ride. For a time after the beginning of the coverage, as mostly only rural electorate votes had been counted, it was appearing that the National Party was going to achieve a comfortable margin of victory. However, Colin James (who doesn't vote), as part of TVOne's coverage, continually voiced the assurance that when the results from the major centres started coming in, we could expect Labour to catch up.

Catch up is what they did, of course, with Labour securing one more parliamentary seat than National on the night. This can be somewhat expected to change, however, as the two-hundred and eighteen thousand special votes have yet to be counted. The special votes encompass many old folks' homes, and as such it is anticipated that they will yield a significant boost to National's share of the vote. There also exists the possibility that the counting of these votes may produce the electoral downfall of the Greens, who are clinging precariously to five point one per cent of the party vote. Some political analysts have expressed, however, the belief that there may actually be a reasonable number of votes for the Greens among the special votes. If that is the case then there is the potential for the Greens' seventh list MP, Nandor Tanzcos, to gain a seat in Parliament.

The idea that the election results will not actually be finalised until the first of October, due to the fact that special votes have to be counted, is an unsettling one. In contrast to many people's circumstantial moods on election night, everything is now shrouded by remarkable uncertainty and apprehension. As the results stand now, though, to me it seems possible that the left of Parliament -- Labour, Greens, the Maori Party and Jim Anderton's Progressive Party -- could form a solid and stable coalition government, but crucially not without the fluid support of the arguably untrustworthy United Future, or the inarguably untrustworthy New Zealand First. The parties of the right -- National and Act -- could form a coalition government with Peter and Winston also, albeit a potentially unstable one given the fact that they would have to incorporate both of the two fluid parties.

Of course, it is too early to make any solid predictions, but in my eyes those are the two primary ways that it could work. Whether there is a change of government or not, I think that in the end we are going to see a very strong and solid left-wing force in Parliament, next to a rather fragmented and unstable right-wing made up of conflicting self-interested individuals. Speaking of whom, I was anticipating that I was going to be including an obituary for Rodney Hide today, but much to the surprise of the majority of people he has defied most of the predictions and taken out the Epsom seat, resulting in him and one other ACT MP keeping seats in Parliament. For that, I personally am glad, because "that little ferret of a man" -- as my geography teacher of last year spoke of him when he couldn't put his finger on the name -- is one of those entertainingly obnoxious individuals who adds a splash of the tongue-in-cheek quality to Parliament. Not that he means to seem tongue-in-cheek.