The 2 simple reasons why Labour won an unprecedented MMP majority 

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The mythical group of National voters who Party voted Labour to keep the Greens out.

There are 2 very simple reasons why Labour won an unprecedented MMP majority.

1 – Psychological reset of the electorate 

Every single major academic research of psychology tells us that after a natural disaster or a crisis, it doesn’t matter if you are Left or Right, there is a reset switch that goes on in our brains as a species to be far more altruistic.

This makes evolutionary sense, our species has always had to reset after a natural disaster, and that deeply hard wired need to help one another even if you yourself have suffered has played into changing the psychology of the entire electorate.

Punters and politicians didn’t appreciate the uniqueness of the universal shared experience we had with the lockdown, nor understand the solidarity it inspired because our 35 year neoliberal experiment culturally celebrates Individualism Uber Allas, and as such, no one  recognised the bonds that solidarity created.

What made Jacinda such an extraordinary leader was her emotional intelligence understood that solidarity before anyone else did. When people were at their most frightened and most altruistic, she communicated strength, courage and empathy in a way that would make Churchill proud.

If you ask the average Kiwi who is voting Labour this year to name just one Labour Party policy, I would put money down on the vast majority of them answering with, ‘Jacinda saved NZ?’

When your policy platform is seen by the vast majority of people as ‘saving our lives’, you have built an emotional 20 lane multi level motorway suspension bridge towards a mandate that demands use.

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The psychology of the NZ electorate has fundamentally shifted. All the female voters Labour lost to Key have all come home to Labour for Jacinda. The strength of this solidarity afterglow must be nurtured if it is to bloom into anything meaningful.

2 – The demographic death spiral of National

What’s fascinating about the National Party Autopsy is that NO ONE has pointed out that this result marks the death spiral of the Party and that the Boomer dominance over political influence is now finally ended!

The National Party campaign was a train-wreck dumpster fire that collided with a school bus that exploded next to a pet store.

Simon Bridges fell foul of the sudden solidarity created by Covid and National were caught flat footed by a crisis that only became worse by more free market deregulation.

No one wanted to hear about the State being cut back when everyone was running to the State for safety.

It highlighted the utter vacancy of National Party ideology, all they kept coming up with was privatisation!

Their position on the border was farcical…


National Party Border Policy in 6 frames

…and that’s after you had to accept a former President of the Party leaking privileged information to a National MP who then leaked it to the media, another MP sending sext texts, another Party Offical smearing their own candidate, and the Todd Muller coup ignited by cowardice.

The hollowness of National’s ideology created an enormous friction on the Right and once the woke gave Seymour the freedom of speech war and ACT hit 2MPs, they became the fault line for this backlash against National.

ACT became the Values Party of the Right the way the Greens are the Values Party of the Left.

The collapse of National is the end of a political dynasty and shows we as a country have finally hit the upper limit of boomer influence and farming political power. From here on in, National will decline as a political force while ACT radicalises more of the right and grows.

We are seeing the seeds sown of a far more polarised political future in NZ.

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40 COMMENTS

  1. COVID19….the end.

    Same reason the Liberals are riding high in the opinion polls (for what they are worth) in Australia.

  2. The ball is in National’s court to become more relevant. At this stage they aren’t accepting as astonishingly no one has yet fallen on their sword. This is a marked change from 2002 where the party did change itself. I fear National now mirrors all the corporates I have worked for where self interest trumps personal responsibility. The irony is clear when you read National’s founding principles.

    That said I have never seen such a dramatic rejection of traditional voters by Labour as I have seen over the past 48 hours. The blatant nature will come back to bite them in the end as it will mean

    a) no transformational policies
    b) Limited ability to push social agendas

    We are already seeing this with the zoning changes proposed for Auckland schools. This type of policy is about as popular as a dog shitting on mission bay beach. Watch for Key like backflips if focus groups says the middle will hate it.

    On this basis Government becomes a cult of personality with the bureaucracy running policy.

    This is actually going to be a fascinating 3 years after I had such low expectations come Sunday morning.

    • Yeah Frank – and more roads’ roads’ roads’? is ging to be their call again, – ‘which is a road to no-where’ sunshine
      Us taxpayers are tired of propping up the truckes that daily destroy our roads,
      Enough is enoiugh.

      • No no no. This went down as well with the electorate as a prostate Exam. Read my latest posts – National needs to become relevant again to large portions of the population. This will require fresh thinking, fresh faces and a container-load of discipline and collectivity. Making Chris Carter look loyal is using Jacinda’s words bad optics.

        Yes we do need to “pivot”

        • Frank good luck for a change with National as they are glued steadfast to the leadership of the RTF (Road Transport Forum) who are prinipallly repesenti ng Heavy freight trucking bussiness so their voting willl shrink even further and that their demise.

  3. The main reason Labour won was it’s progressive, highly intelligent, positive, kind and inclusive leader.

    People above $$.

    Covid helped make the winning margin bigger because it gave NZ another opportunity to see just what a wonderful leader they have and just how utterly inept the National Party is at this time. Fearmongering, divisive, negative and toxic dinosaurs. Having the diabolical Chucky as their leader was made even worse if that’s possible by her deputy Brownstain. The fact Brownstain and Sour Milk Smith were sent packing from their long held safe seats highlights what a state they are in. Incredulous that both of those losers would 100% ignore the wishes of NZ voters and stay in Parliament. That action alone is yet more compelling evidence of how self interest is at the heart of the 2020 edition of the National Party.

    • Apart from our mate Frankie those on the right dont see Nationals failings. Quite rightly they have dead wood in Brownlee and Smith that is undisputed yet Collins sees them as saviors. Right there is one of the reasons Labour won, Nationals continued arrogance and Joyce’s intervention in 2002 to run National as a business, not a political party.

    • Yes, Jacindafan! I had that same thought: Collins, Brownlee, Goldsmith, Woodhouse….. why are they still there?
      Not listening are they?

    • Hahahaha does Jacinda pay to write that stuff? Also, I recall you scolding someone for stupid name calling. I see you are an expert at it.

      • Again Herman, tell me again why National should have won the election?

        This morning, I saw our local MP David Bennett on a corner street( 7.20am) with a sign ” thank you”. Wasnt sure he was waiting on special votes to be counted or whether he has lost touch of reality. The issue is I saw Greens and Labour MP’s yet have not seen Bennett for the last two terms. I have heard him advocating for farmers on the country am Radio show yet not seen nor heard anything about the Hamilton East urban areas. Then I saw a story of farms he owns 3x dairy farms and a dry stock property. Bennett lost the Urban vote because of arrogance.

  4. I hope they bring in the four year terms as soon as possible. At the moment every party is in agreement about this, but that agreement may not last. Three years is not long enough to bring in some needed changes, certainly not in any carefully considered way.

    • I’ve yet to hear of any builders or tradies going tits up in the first 2 plus years of the coalition govt? So the housing target was not achieved. But when same tradies have been building upmarket houses and apartments why would they go for “affordable” housing?
      Simple answer: high material costs and insufficient numbers of available tradies.
      3 years is not enough time to reset and make progress with good policy.

  5. Is National actually out for good, to be replaced by ACT?

    I think this is unlikely. Most people on the right and centre right of politics don’t want political policies as libertarian as those of ACT. National has been the natural home of centre right voters for 80 years, across nearly 4 generations. It seems unlikely the fifth generation will permanently desert National, though they could well take more than one term to come back.

    Of course major parties can disappear, it happened to the Liberals 100 years ago, when they were replaced by Labour on the Left. But I personally don’t think ACT is about to replace National.

    Labour has won a huge number of National voters who normally vote National. Jacinda in fact recognises this. Will they stay with Labour?

    History would indicate they will do so for the 2023 election. which would mean a 3 term Labour led government. That is fact the norm in New Zealand politics. In the last 45 years, all but one government have been in office for three terms.

    Yes, National has to rebuild. It has to win the centre right back again and it has to be able to attract a good proportion of those currently aged 18 to 45, and in particular those aged 30 to 45.

    If Labour does win in 2023, then the next National Prime Minister is likely to be elected in 2026, and if things went particularly badly, for the first time in 2029. He or she will be of a different generation to the current leadership, and presumably will have more forward looking policies, suited to the challenges of the 2030’s.

  6. ” Every single major academic research of psychology tells us that after a natural disaster or a crisis, it doesn’t matter if you are Left or Right, there is a reset switch that goes on in our brains as a species to be far more altruistic.”
    Balls. Fuck psychology.
    After my life was fucked by 18,000 + earthquakes while I watched Big Jizz brownlee dance on the graves of my business, my house, my personal relationship, my neighbours and friends and my life generally I’ve not found the mythical switch unless it was to the gallows or the chair. I flicked it a few times but the power must have been disconnected.
    And FUCK the Blue right wing for perilously putting us all at risk for their greed and wanky ego’s over the many years.
    Each one of those worthless fuckers in the image above are on six figures a year plus expenses and reimbursements while the unlucky and unlovely live and die in the gutters.
    The fucking pricks above will get no psychologically mythical sympathy from me and the sooner they’re asset stripped and imprisoned the better.
    Oop. Sorry. Forgot I was not still flicking the switch.
    Maybe? Just maybe the natzo’s ‘lost’ simply because they’re arseholes?

    • You’re half way there.
      The natz have always been arseholes, never stopped them winning before.
      Simply because their client base are arseholes who will vote for the same shimmering star.
      What changed was that those arseholes who vote for the arseholes, knew that if their elected arseholes got voted into power, they themselves faced a real risk of death.
      And when you are a self centred arsehole, the last thing you want is prescribed death, because that precludes you from doing what you do so well, expelling shit.

  7. There’s only one way National can win power in foreseeable future and it is infallible . They just need to persuade jacinda to become National’s leader instead of labour’s.
    D J S

  8. Reason #3

    After 26 years of incrementalism under MMP which just further entrenched the damaging Ruthanasia and Rogernomics reforms, people finally wanted real change. They saw Labour as being the only option to deliver such needed reforms.

    Labour has a mandate to reform for the better. And fast. That 50% support will ebb away over three years with scandals that come out such as the upcoming scandal with the “choice tenant” scam where WINZ is paying some Remuera luvvie $140 per person that fills out an online e-learning quiz asking basic questions like “who puts out the rubbish? You or the Landlord?”. Apparently people who do the quiz get a “choice tenant” certificate which is apparently supposed to help them secure a rental property. But there’s been absolutely no guarantee provided from parasite managers that anyone with a “choice tenant” certificate will even be a preferred applicant.

    That sort of terrible middle manager decision shite is what causes Labour to lose elections.

    • If what you say is true, and I have no reason to disbelieve you, I agree 100%.
      Labour either needs to flush out the bureaucracy that makes these decisions or reduce their pay to 18.90.
      Personally, after working in a couple of public departments, I see the need to employ these people as they have no hope of a job in the real world, but let’s not pay them 100 k plus for doing next to nothing and the things they do do are even worse than nothing.

  9. I think an appropriate word to use is exposed – National were exposed for what they truly are. Similar to bad employers being exposed now and over the last few months.

  10. There is only one simple reason why Labour won an unprecedented MMP majority.
    Their victory over covid.
    It is disgusting and shocking that New Zealanders who voted in big numbers for Labour in reward for keeping covid out of this country, and then to be betrayed by the newly elected Labour government as soon as the election is over by risking our hard won covid free status to appease a rapacious fishing company.
    The greatest number of the workforce of these factory ships is on the processing floor, any able bodied general labourer or factory hand could do it.
    After all the sacrifices we have all made I was looking forward to a covid free summer. (I presume many others were too, especially all the hard hit music and entertainment and events industry not to mention all the small business cafes and restaurants, who were hoping to recoup their losses made during lockdown.
    This has all been put at risk by corporate greed and government caving in to corporate lobbying pressure.
    But, while Chris Faafoi has been crawling to Sealords at the big end of twon, a small girl is being deported and separated from her family and Chris Faafoi has no comment.
    In the wake of the covid election in which large numbers of New Zealanders even in traditional National held seats voted Labour. This girl’s unlikely champion Nick Smith has lost his seat. Has the new Labour MP for Nelson who unseated Nick Smith got anything to say about this small girl and her family?

    Smith offers assurance to family of Nelson girl facing deportation
    Tim O’Connell 05:00, Oct 01 2020

    …….The girl’s mother said she was grateful for Smith’s support for the family.

    “We are more settled now that we have Nick to fight for our case, unlike a few weeks back [when we were] full of worries and fears.”

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/122933641/smith-offers-assurance-to-family-of-nelson-girl-facing-deportation

    • “Talley’s donated a total of $40,000 to eight other candidates during the 2017 election campaign – seven from the National Party and one from Labour – giving each of them $5000. All eight donations were disclosed by the respective candidates.”

      “One of the country’s biggest fishing companies, Talley’s, and its managing director donated nearly $27,000 to the New Zealand First Foundation, which has been bankrolling the New Zealand First Party.”

      https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/in-depth/410299/concerns-over-secret-fisheries-donations-to-nz-first-foundation

      • This is a problem with employers …they’ve been allowed to externalize a cost they once bore …training. Companies used to take people on without experience & train them on the job/provide a path in company for people to rise/move up & sideways in company. Now they expect every worker to be pre trained and/or have previous experience (in effect relying on poaching from other employers locally & internationally). Who bears this cost? …Worker & Gov …but then company cries poor me I can’t get the skilled experienced workers I need so let me import them oh & btw I can pay them less & offer worse conditions …meanwhile workers don’t take step to train for that job coz they they don’t see good wages, good conditions & job ads as company is busy recruiting in second world/third world countries & filling jobs with foreigners. On other hand educated skilled workers(study partly paid by the taxpayers) look around & don’t see the job ops coz they’ve been taken by outsiders so they go offshore. Meanwhile the supermarkets & fast food joints, bus drivers, taxi drivers are filled up with Indian imports who have replaced/supplanted the Maori, Pacific Islanders & Pakeha who used to fill those roles. I’m not a supporter of the rightwing racial “replacement” theory …but is true that the mass immigration is crowding out Maori, Pasifika & Pakeha within/from the labour market.

        • and in 1992 it was National under Jimmy Bolger and his mates Birch, Richardson, Shipley & Co who disbanded the apprenticeship system supervised by the Dept of Labour and regional apprenticeship committees on the basis that ‘market forces’ would dictate the supply of skilled workers in New Zealand, yeah right!

    • Pat I heard an Act voter say he voted for See- more cause he likes classic cars and how many voted for them just so they could keep their guns, this stupidity when many said 16 year olds weren’t mature enough.

    • They weren’t betrayed by the newly elected Labour government as soon as the election was over. Moves to have people come into NZ have been afoot for some time.

      And if they weren’t maybe Labour wouldn’t have been elected over the kerfuffle from not letting any workers come in.

      Having different dealings with different companies like the despised fishing one, is another whole game. Playing politics if you like.

    • Something is rotten in the fishing industry. Late yesterday on Stuff: Sealords job ads to evade immigration rules

      Apart from that duplicity, if their excuse is “This is the way we’ve done it for 25 years”, then why have they allowed 25 years to go by without training up Kiwis for the job. (My other comments on this are over on Friday’s Open Mike replying to CiP, before I found Pat’s comment.)

  11. I think point 1 cannot be overstated enough. I watched Jacinda’s press conference with Ashley when Covid reappeared for the second time and it was exactly what we needed. Calm heads, simple concise explanations, reassurance. Whilst some precious people on the left spat their artisan water out at the slightly overused “team of 5 million” (Ahem…Polly Gillespie), it’s pretty obvious now that the language resonated with a much larger section of the populace than would have been the fact if we’d had a Collins or Clark or a Key doing it. That engagement was a big part of the success in making the elimination strategy work. And shared success creates trust, which played a big part in the election result.

    Point 2 – Where do you start?! Collins was never the right person to get a win for National. As many people hated her as liked her, even in her own party. She’s as dishonest as the night is long. Also, in which universe is tax cuts that favour the rich an answer to an economic crises that’s hurting the poor the most? A few years ago National was arguing that the economy was doing so well and the government bringing in so much money, that we should be giving some back in the form of tax cuts. So tax cuts are the answer when the economy is booming, and also the answer when the economy is tanking? It appears National are just blinded by ideology at this point.

  12. The opening of polling booths for weeks gave dead-beat Labour voters more opportunity to vote. The 82.5% turnout reflects that.

  13. Burtonn I am offended with the term “boomer” as it is a radical belief all elders are greedy and rich.

    I was born in 1944 as another generation so far missed in this generalisation which is called the “silent Generation” before the baby “boomers Generation came along post world war two in 1946.

    As as Martynthis goes he is singling out us all as “just older folks” maybe, so I wonder if it includes us world war two generations too?

  14. I can’t see any reason to celebrate Nationals demise. Boomers or not, this new Labour Government will gain momentum and strength, or start to weaken and disintegrate all on their own. Are you lot going to flog the dead horse of National for the next three years or start to seriously critique this new Government thats entering it’s fourth year of Governance with fuck all to show for it. MMP, the virus, the boomers or National will have little affect on us compared to the economic and social decisions that this Government has to make in the next three years. If I was from the left and wanted a Labour Government to remain in power I would be worried when looking at their record for the last three years. The last nine years banter is fast fading into a non argument and the team of 5 million including you die hard labour fans will be expecting a brave new world to emerge or the new foundations of social, climatic and economic progress will crumble to dust. poking a stick at who and who isn’t in the National opposition is an exercise in futility, or are you having your last bit of fun before the real worry starts.

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