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LAWRENCE SMITH / Things
The Labor Party has won the elections and has secured enough seats to govern alone.
Election night saw New Zealand’s largest city turn red, with some of Auckland’s “safe” national seats held by Labor.
Upper Harbor, in the hands of former Deputy National Party Leader Paula Bennett since its formation in 2014, saw a Labor victory, with Vanushi Walters winning the most votes over National’s Jake Bezzant.
Northcote’s reasonably safe blue seat also appears to see an upset, with Labor’s Shanan Halbert claiming the seat from incumbent Dan Bidois, after six consecutive elections won by National, at 1 a.m. Sunday, with less than 1 percent of the votes to count.
STUFF
Jacinda Ardern called for a “mandate to speed up” in her victory speech after Labor’s landslide victory.
But perhaps the biggest surprise of all came in Auckland Central, with Green Party candidate Chlöe Swarbrick taking the hotly contested seat over Labor’s Helen White and National’s Emma Mellow in a surprising victory.
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The 26-year-old fought a close contest with White, with only about 500 votes among the pair for most of the count.
The Labor Party also removed the newly created Takanini electorate from the city in South Auckland, which was expected to start life with the National, with candidate Neru Leavasa, a GP and metastatic bone cancer survivor.
MPs Carmel Sepuloni, Michael Wood and Phil Twyford remained in their respective seats at Kelston, Mt Roskill and Te Atatū.
RYAN ANDERSON / Stuff
Green Party MP Chloe Swarbrick won the hotly contested Auckland Central seat.
Continuing the Labor stronghold of more than seven decades, Jacinda Ardern held onto the Mt Albert seat with a clear majority: 23,198 votes to Melissa Lee’s 6,621 votes.
Two electorates saw wider margins than others.
Lynn’s new MP Deborah Russell remained in her seat, winning by more than 10,000 votes over runner-up Lisa Whyte, and Panmure-Ōtāhuhu MP Jenny Salesa was victorious, with a difference of 13,500 votes.
It also seemed likely that Labor would stick with the two Maori electorates that covered the Auckland region.
With 97 percent of the votes counted, Peeni Henare seemed set to take Tāmaki Makaurau with fewer than 900 votes over Maori Party co-leader John Tamihere.
Te Tai Tokerau, the Northland Maori electorate covering parts of North and West Auckland, was won by Deputy Labor Leader and incumbent Kelvin Davis.
Abigail Dougherty / Stuff
Christopher Luxon speaking to the media after winning the national team as an MP for Botany.
However, it was not all doom and gloom for National in Auckland.
Opposition leader Judith Collins held onto Papakura’s seat, beating the Labor candidate by 6,000 votes.
Unsurprisingly, former Air New Zealand CEO Christopher Luxon was victorious in Botany, with 16,000 votes out of 11,838 for the Labor candidate.
National’s Erica Stanford won the East Coast Bays by more than 800 votes, and Chris Penk held on to the newly formed electorate Kaipara ki Mahurangi (Helensville).
There wasn’t much going on between National and Labor in Maungakiekie, with Denise Lee winning by just over 1,000 votes.
National’s Simeon Brown had an easy victory in Pakuranga, receiving more than double the votes for Labor candidate Nerissa Henry.
The Whangaparaoā electorate, first created for the 2020 elections, was won by National MP Mark Mitchell.
ACT Party leader David Seymour maintained his stronghold at Epsom, with more than 16,400 votes, and appears poised to bring nine new MPs to parliament after increasing his percentage of party votes.
The election was a huge victory for Labor as a whole, who claimed 49 percent of the overall vote, meaning he could rule alone.
