Upper Harbour exists.

Written By: - Date published: 7:12 pm, April 17th, 2014 - 18 comments
Categories: election 2014 - Tags:

The new electorate boundaries are out.

Some noticeable changes around Port Hills, but mainly only tinkering from the previous proposals.

So Paula Bennett can go from committed Westie to Shore girl in the new Upper Harbour electorate.

Phil Goff & Ruth Dyson aren’t having their electorates painted quite so blue, but Jacinda gets a harder task.

Of course, what really matters is the party vote, and the boundaries don’t affect that.  But now it’s drawn up, we’re fully ready to go for the election.  Let’s get out there and wrest this country back – how many electorates can go left?

18 comments on “Upper Harbour exists. ”

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  1. felix 1
    17 April 2014 at 7:34 pm

    wrest 😉

    rest was last time.

    [Ben: write ewe arrh! Fixed, thanks]

  2. mickysavage 2
    17 April 2014 at 8:02 pm

    Agreed Ben. I read Jadis’s post at Kiwiblog and I kept thinking WTF?

    I hear that John Key was really unhappy at the prospect of having to represent pretty well all of the Waitakere Ranges and I don’t blame him. There are a bunch of socially liberal and environmentally protective people there that will really make him work hard.

    My personal predictions is that in the new seat of Kelston Labour will shoe in and Labour will also win Maungakiekie and I would not be surprised if my mate Jerome Mika ran Judith Collins very close in Papakura.

    The rest of Jadis’s analysis is a joke. Trevor Mallard will very comfortably win Hutt South. You have to laugh at Chris Bishop’s announcement that he will be the National candidate on today. Someone obviously thought they would get an advantage by announcing today. And Christchurch Central is coming back to Labour.

    Napier is also on the way back. And I would not rule out Rotorua or Whangarei.

    But it is MMP and only party votes count …

    • David H 2.1
      18 April 2014 at 7:07 am

      Why the fuck is Mallard allowed within 5000 miles of Hutt South is beyond me. He needs to be GONE along with a few other dead wood dinosaurs.

  3. Sanctuary 3
    17 April 2014 at 8:57 pm

    “…Napier is also on the way back…”

    Nash will win on the back of local issues, which only goes to show the importance in provincial seats of selecting candidates that resonate with the locals & have name recognition.

  4. Instauration 4
    17 April 2014 at 10:36 pm

    Paula is a Shore Girl pretending Westie. Years of loyal service to Murray in ECB and commensurately comfortable and hospitable residence in Milford. The Yupper Harbourites still appear bluish – just like the bruises on Matt Blomfields face. Is essentially an Aspirant and Delusional zone – but they still sell plenty of Lotto.

  5. Tigger 5
    17 April 2014 at 10:59 pm

    Paula’s looking very Shore matronish these days. No more pretending to be a Westie. Upper Harbour for her. Hope Craig wants it – seagulls over a soggy chip.

  6. hoom 6
    18 April 2014 at 12:23 am

    First: One thing Granny Herald has wound up being very good at is these interactive maps, the one in this article is really good.

    Second: (admittedly using imprecise eyeballing via the Herald map & noting that Party vote is vastly more important than Electorates) There seems to be an awful lot of cases where a few pro-Labor polling stations get hived off into either already strong Labor electorates leaving an apparent Nat majority in a previously close Electorate, or switches of several strong Nat stations into previously balanced/narrow Labor electorates.

    Third: A bunch of the Proposed changes that would have weakened small majority Nat Electorates have been reversed in the Final boundaries or additional Nat polling stations added to offset Labor stations & preserve .

    Unless there has been a huge swing to Labor which the polls don’t show I predict there will be very few Labour Electoral seats this Election but many of those few will have significantly increased majorities.
    Meanwhile many strong Nat seats will have reduced but still safe margins while the newly Nat electorates will have fairly narrow margins.

    Frankly has the apperance of a whole bunch of intentional gerrymandering which I find deeply troubling having previously believed the Electoral Commission to have been legitimately non-political.

    • hoom 6.1
      18 April 2014 at 1:13 am

      Can’t edit but: I had looked at the Proposed boundaries & felt they had a fair balance of loss/gain for both major parties.

      There appears to be strong gain to National in many electorates in the Final boundaries.

      Don’t mean to imply direct intentional bias by Electoral Commission but they may have been unwittingly swayed by a concerted campaign in submissions.

    • felix 6.2
      18 April 2014 at 4:17 am

      Very interesting, hoom.

      Also interesting is that if instead of following the link in the article we go directly to the infographic from the herald dropdown menu, we find some actual factual analysis which notes exactly what you point out: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/infographics/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503250&objectid=11163748

    • Draco T Bastard 6.3
      18 April 2014 at 4:59 am

      And all of that is why we need to get rid of electorates and go purely proportional.

    • karol 6.4
      18 April 2014 at 7:30 am

      Labour – you’re not in Ausie now, Mr Hoom.

      Interesting analysis.

    • Lanthanide 6.5
      18 April 2014 at 9:55 am

      How do you know the electoral commission even looked at voting tendencies when drawing the boundaries?

      If they had had any sense, they would have deliberately not looked at the voting pattern, so as to avoid accusations of bias, as you’ve just made.

      • felix 6.5.1
        18 April 2014 at 10:12 am

        Yes you would hope not. I suppose that’s why it seems odd that almost all of the changes swing in one direction.

        Also: “Don’t mean to imply direct intentional bias by Electoral Commission but they may have been unwittingly swayed by a concerted campaign in submissions.“

  7. Jeff 7
    18 April 2014 at 5:15 am

    When you zoom out the blue overlaps red which looks like National dominate….would expect nothing less from the Herald.

    • Markymark 7.1
      18 April 2014 at 11:44 am

      Umm…..thats cause do National dominate. They won nearly double the votes of labour(48% to 27% in a landslide in 2011).

      The map is based on that – hate to break it to ya, but labour ain’t popular

  8. tricledrown 8
    18 April 2014 at 1:10 pm

    Mark my mark.
    Carry on thinking FPP.
    What’s the govts majority Zero plus P () Dunny.
    We have had MMP for 18 years now.
    MyM your out of date.

  9. Mike the Savage One 9
    19 April 2014 at 11:55 pm

    Like a friend tells me, the success of Paula Bennett, who may run in this electorate after all, is based on Labour’s failings in welfare. It is not quite so easy to understand, but when you realise that Labour was heading down the same direction as this present government, just pretended it was “more humane”, then you may get it.

    They brought in reforms in the 2004 to 2007 time frame, and it was going the way the reforms in the UK went, and that has to do with such ones as a Mr Aylward and here a Dr Bratt, and add that together , you learn what it was about. Do some google search, and more, and I think you will find some information on what I am talking about.

    Bennett is a nasty one, but Labour are dishonest about where they stand, they do not even mention welfare in their program now, so in secret they agree with Bennett. Try running a candidate against her, I think Labour will have a battle at their hands, for pure hypocrisy reasons, none else.

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