Posts by Graeme Edgeler
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Legal Beagle: Election '11: the special votes, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
But won’t they just pick some future star who’s a likely for the next election, but didn’t make the list cut this year, and make them do it?
No.
At least, that was my theory in the Mana By-election. People were arguing that MPs should be banned from running in by-elections, and I thought that that was unwise.
Hekia Parata ran in Mana in 2008. She had an electorate office and presence in Mana throughout the 2008-2011 term. Having worked up a relationship with the community in Mana it would have been wrong to force National (if it wanted to contest the by-election) to select a new candidate who would contest the by-election only, or to force Parata to resign.
There is no requirement for a list MP elected at a by-election to be replaced as a list MP, but if people have a concern about the process by which the voters of Mt Albert might vote for Phil Twyford and get Judith Tizard, having a rule that this doesn't happen seems to be a good way of doing it. If a party really did want a replacement list MP, it could get one, but only if the list MP resigned to contest the by-election, not if they resigned after winning the by-election.
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Legal Beagle: Election '11 -…, in reply to Hans Versluys,
How do I add this to the MMP review process?
You don't. If there aren't electorates, it's not really MMP. You'd also possibly find that John Key was the MP for about 80% of the electorates in the country :-)
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Legal Beagle: Election '11: the special votes, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
What political party is going to let someone run off the list to an electoral by-election, if it means they lose a seat in the house?
One that wants to win it :-)
One that doesn't want Judith Tizard or Paul Quinn to return from the list?
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Legal Beagle: Election '11 -…, in reply to Steve Curtis,
No blips on the radar over Chris Auchinvole who lost the West Coast Tasman seat seems to suggest which side is complaining the most
Well, it's not like his opponent can complain, having been a back-door MP himself!
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Legal Beagle: Election '11 -…, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
There’s also the fact that parties would simply ensure that their favoured list candidates were also running in winnable seats.
Another reason to oppose it. Which, I'll note, I currently do :-)
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Legal Beagle: Election '11 -…, in reply to Dave Guerin,
someone like Gareth Hughes (a quality candidate) told people he only wanted the party vote
I did think of that, but then realised that that's what absolutely every Green candidate was saying, so decided it could be held against him. The capriciousness of it all (you'd have parties doing better at the polls, but MPs losing their jobs, not because they didn't do better, but because others did better-er) is the reason I'm currently against.
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Legal Beagle: Election '11 -…, in reply to NBH,
I presume that any such shenanigans are avoided through party affiliation of electorate candidates being formally determined at the point of nomination, so Banks would be an ‘ACT’ candidate even if he’d resigned from the party and joined National the day before the election. Just wanted to make completely sure that was the case though – it could be amusing if there was no explicit statement to that effect…
Banks was nominated as an ACT candidate. End of story.
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Hard News: Democracy Night, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
It’s the optimal setting for a House of Representatives
I not too unhappy with how its looks for the next week-and-a-half, myself.
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Up Front: What if We Held an Election…, in reply to Emma Hart,
No-one’s counted the referendum votes, people.
They've counted yours!
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Partner picks me up. “Do you want to hear the bad news?”
“Do you mean, ’Do I want to hear the bad news first?’”
“Um. No.”
“Fuck.”
There was good news! MMP!!