Legal Beagle by Graeme Edgeler

Thanks for the explainer - I must say I hadn't known anything really about the Special Votes before!

Last Night I didn’t think the specials would make any difference. After reading your analysis and thinking about it I have concluded don’t create a model at 2:15am and think it makes sense. That is my model not yours.

My model does create a different result than yours. That is because I have made some assumptions
1. that Labour’s Specials will be weaker that 2017. Based on election night they are higher in 2020 and less room to increase.
2. I assumed that both National and ACT will have fewer about 15% special that election night votes
3. To me it appears that turn out is well over 80%. I expect this to mean that a lot of younger voters that proportionally will have voted Green. I therefore boast the Greens by more than 2017
So my model results

Specials
Votes %
Labour 255,218 51.56%
National 112,789 22.79%
ACT 33,587 6.79%
Green 56,191 11.35%
Maori 8,309 1.68%
NZ First 11,626 2.35%
Others 17,280 3.49%

Final
Votes % Seats
Labour 1,424,615 49.53% 64
National 751,182 26.11% 34
ACT 223,693 7.78% 10
Green 236,415 8.22% 11
Maori 32,247 1.12% 1
NZ First 75,073 2.61% 0
Others 133,247 4.63% 0

...all of which is very interesting if you're not-a-fan of Nick Smith. With 34 National seats (and no changes to the number of electorates won by National) he misses out on getting back in on the list - http://polled.co.nz/mmpcalculator.php

I think open lists are an option. There is an option used in the London Assembly. However for this to work in NZ that would mean some kind of regionising lists to get the options short enough

The overseas votes will be interesting - whilst they usually apparently have a stronger Green presence, I suspect this year Labour will do pretty well, as Ardern has had a very high positive profile overseas. I certainly have a lot of people semi randomly praise her to me here in London (not Kiwis) and I suspect that will feed into voter sentiment.

…all of which is very interesting if you’re not-a-fan of Nick Smith. With 34 National seats (and no changes to the number of electorates won by National) he misses out on getting back in on the list

I think Maureen Pugh loses her seat first, so National would have to drop to 33 seats (without losing an electorate) for Nick Smith to miss out. If he does, though, I think Trevor Mallard will then be Father of the House.

2PM today, today! Hope everyone is excited!

Let's face it, Nick Smith is dead man walking. The Nats can be quite ruthless when it comes to purging the weak and discarded, so this may be his last term and probably Gerrys as well.