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ANALYSIS: Most of the people in New Zealand are voters of two brands.
That is, they vote for the same party in their local electorate and in their party vote. 68.14 percent of voters chose not to split their votes this year, a drop from 72.67 percent in the last election, but roughly on par with 68.36 percent of the vote in 2017.
But recently released figures from the Election Commission show that the people who divided their vote were very important to two of the most important and momentous results of the 2020 elections: the return of the Maori Party to Parliament through a victory in Waiariki and the Green Party’s victory in Auckland Central, an insurance policy that means they are unlikely to leave Parliament anytime soon.
HOW DIVISION WAS THROUGH THE COUNTRY
Labor voters were far more likely to split their votes than national voters: 22 percent voted for someone else in one seat, compared to just 12.41 percent of voters for National’s party.
In part, this will reflect the fact that there were simply far more Labor voters than national voters this year: the party won more than half of the total vote and a plurality of party votes in all voters except Epsom. The national voters who remained with the party are likely to be very partisan.
The majority of divided Labor Party voters backed a national candidate: 116,000 voters out of 1.38 million supporters of the Labor Party.
ALDEN WILLIAMS / Stuff
The voting division won two key races in the 2020 elections.
Many of those Labor Party voters live in areas with fairly well-established local national MPs, which could mean that they have a personal connection to a local MP or that they see a victory from them as inevitable.
University of Auckland political science professor Dr Lara Greaves said that many people who voted twice, even knowing their candidate had no chance, reflected “genuine partisan attachment.”
“These are people with strong party identifiers – they identify as green voters from start to finish, even if that doesn’t strategically maximize the influence of their vote.”
A large portion of Labor voters supported the Green Party in one seat (around 77,000 voters) even though the Green Party only had one chance in one seat. More of that in a minute.
Almost all voters in the national parties endorsed the National Party candidates: about 647,000 of the party’s 718,000 total voters, about 90 percent.
A handful of votes went to candidates for Labor seats or candidates for ACT, about 20,000 each.
Voters from minority parties are much more likely to split their votes, since minor parties don’t have much of a chance in most electorates.
Unsurprisingly, a large portion of Green Party voters backed the Labor candidates: 130,000 of the party’s 221,000 voters, nearly 60 percent of all Green Party voters.
Similarly, many ACT voters backed the national candidates: 143,000 out of 213,000, or about two-thirds.
Greaves said it was much easier for divided voters not to cross the partisan divide, dividing their votes within the left or right wing.
“If you are on the left and you are strategically voting for another candidate from the left, that is not a huge leap. Don’t create that feeling of discomfort and dissonance. “
Greaves said there was also some generation gap, with people who grew up under the MMP system much more comfortable dividing their vote.
It was Labor voters casting their vote for someone else on the left that led to two of the biggest windfall victories of the election.
ROBERT KITCHEN / Things
Maori Party leaders Rawiri Waititi won Wairaiki thanks to many Labor voters.
HOW LABOR VOTERS WON TWO SEATS FOR OTHER PARTIES
In both Waiariki and Auckland Central, a large number of Labor Party voters voted for a candidate outside of that party.
In Waiariki, more than a third of Labor voters backed the Maori party’s Rawiri Waititi, about 5,650 votes, enough to jump Waititi over the line and beat Labor Party’s Tamati Coffey, who lost by 415 votes.
In Auckland Central, a third of Labor voters backed Chlöe Swarbrick of the Green Party, around 5,750 voters, a huge number considering that Swarbrick only won by 1,068 votes.
Greaves said the split showed that the Maori Party’s strategy for the elections, where they specifically asked for votes for seats but not party votes, had been successful.
“People listened to the strategy of the Maori Party,” Greaves said.
“Now they have that base and platform for 2023.”
