Labour’s strength spells ‘generational defeat’ for National

The National Party heartland is gone. Jacinda Ardern’s Labour Party has won itself a massive mandate to govern. On current numbers it will have a four-seat majority, the first since MMP was introduced in 1996.

For National, this is a crushing defeat. The careful middle New Zealand coalition built up by John Key and Bill English is gone, plus some.

But there was a clear message from Jacinda Ardern: this will be a unity Government for everyone. That was a clear signal to the more Left-wing elements within Labour that are rubbing their hands together. Some big reforms will be needed, but they won’t necessarily all please the Labour Party base and the Greens may yet end up with nothing.

The party swing to Labour in seats where National usually wins, and wins well, was telling. In Todd Muller’s seat of Bay of Plenty, although Muller won by about 4000 votes, Labour won by the party vote over National by 41 per cent to 33 per cent. There were many others.

National also swept aside Labour in heretofore safe seats.

Rangitata, gone. Hamilton East, gone. Ilam, Gerry Brownlee’s stronghold in Christchurch, gone.

For National this looks like a generational defeat. Although its vote is higher, the gap between National and Labour this election is bigger than it was in 2002 under Bill English.

In the end, both Labour’s proposition to voters and its campaign were too strong. This is a resounding vote of confidence in both Labour’s leadership and its plan for the economy. It will only get harder form here.

Even more significantly this is a massive victory for the left of politics in this country. A mere three years after National and NZ First claimed over half of the vote, Labour and Greens combined look to have claimed nearly 58 per cent of the vote.

The National Party recriminations will begin forthwith.