BBQ time for National

mickysavage
4 years ago
Categories: election 2020, national, paula bennett, same old national, Simon Bridges

With the rather severe dip in National’s polling it is time to dust off the crystal ball and have a look at what may happen in September.

Currently National has 56 seats in Parliament. If one of the polls is correct then this could be reduced to 38 seats, a net loss of 18 seats. Given that National has 41 electorate seats and 15 list seats this is extremely problematic for them.

Although not uniform swings in party support often translate to electorate voting swings. I have taken as a rule of thumb that electorate seats with a majority of less than 5,000 are potentially up for grabs. This is approximately a 12% two party swing.

Assuming this the following seats are under threat:

Auckland Central which is marginal with a National majority of 1,500. With the movement in National support I cannot imagine Nikki Kaye hanging in there, despite some impressive performances in the past.
East Coast which has a majority of 4,800 and where Anne Tolley is going list only could be vulnerable.
Chris Bishop in Hutt South (1,500 majority) has to be gone.
Maungakiekie’s ~~Melissa~~ Denise Lee (2,200) would be gone.
Nick Smith in Nelson (4,200) is under threat.
Matt King in Northland (1,300) would be gone although this is complicated by the fact that Winston was the losing candidate.
Lawrence Rule in Tukituki (2,800) would clearly be under threat.
In Waiarapa Kieran McNulty could become MP if he overcomes a 2,800 majority.
Whanganui (1,700) would surely flip to Labour.

This would leave room for only 6 list MPs. Paula Bennett presumably takes the first slot and Paul Goldsmith the second. Tolley has her eyes on one. I presume they would try and make room for Kaye and Bishop.

But it means their clutch of Ethnic MPs are gone. Jian Yang would have to go back to teaching at Spy School. National’s fundraising would be decimated.

I saw the phenomenon in 2014 where increasingly rattled Labour MPs concentrated on the electorate vote and ignored the party vote. It accentuated the slide and only made things worse.

I suspect that despite the approach of Winter the BBQs are being fired up in National caucus land.