New Zealand Election: 27 July 2002

Research Note Index 2002-03

Research Note no.9 2002-03

New Zealand Election: 27 July 2002

Sarah Miskin
Politics and Public Administration Group
17 September 2002

Introduction

New Zealand's Labour Party has formed another minority coalition government after winning 41 per cent of the vote in the 27 July election. Labour won 52 of Parliament's 120 seats, three more than it won in 1999, but not enough for it to govern alone. Instead, Labour has formed a coalition with the leftist Jim Anderton's Progressive Coalition, which won two seats, and has signed a deal on confidence and supply with the centrist, Christian-focused United Future, which won eight seats. Overall, the outcome is similar to that of the 1999-2002 Labour-Alliance⁽¹⁾ minority government, which had issue-by-issue support from the Greens.

Background

Labour leader Helen Clark called the election four months early, a rare event in New Zealand, where governments traditionally run their full three-year terms. Clark claimed she had to go to the polls because Labour's coalition partner, the Alliance, had fallen apart in a dispute related to its relationship with Labour. Some in the Alliance felt the group was making too many compromises to Labour.

As a result of the wrangling, Alliance leader Jim Anderton split from the party and made it known that he would lead another party into the election. In doing so, he was almost caught in the anti-party-hopping legislation, the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Act 2001, under which any MP who leaves his or her party also has to leave Parliament.⁽²⁾ In April, the Alliance followed the letter of the legislation, but defied its spirit, by splitting the party's leadership and having different leaders inside and outside Parliament. Opposition parties responded by raising numerous points of order in the House over the 'real' leader of the Alliance. Clark said the time spent on such points meant Parliament had become a 'farce' and an election was the only option.

However, Clark had several other reasons for calling an early election:

Opinion polls: Labour had a considerable lead in opinion polls. At the time the election was called, it had 56 per cent support, or enough to gain 67 of Parliament's 120 seats, and thus rule in its own right.

National Party decline: Labour's traditional rival, the National Party, was languishing in the polls, as it had done since the previous election. A leadership coup in which former prime minister Jenny Shipley was replaced with the young and untried Bill English, 40, failed to revitalise the party, and its standing was not helped by internal divisions over controversial new president Michelle Boag. Boag drew fire for using 'new blood' candidates to modernise the party at the expense of sitting MPs.

'Paintergate': Clark remained popular despite being mired in a scandal, dubbed 'Paintergate' (or 'Watercolourgate'), in which she was investigated for forgery for signing an artwork-auctioned for charity- that she had not painted. While police were investigating, a Labour supporter bought the painting and gave it to a Clark staff member, who destroyed it. Police later decided it was not in the public interest to prosecute Clark for forgery, despite finding there was a case to answer.

Issues and Ultimatums

The major issue in the six-week campaign was genetic modification (GM). Although New Zealand currently has no GM crops, a royal commission recommended in July 2001 that the country 'proceed with caution' towards the introduction of GM. In response, the Greens issued an ultimatum saying they would not support the Government beyond October 2003 if it lifted a moratorium on the commercial release of GM organisms that is due to expire at that time. Labour then accused the Greens of holding the Government to ransom, and Clark ruled out the Greens as a possible coalition partner in a new government.

Initially, the Greens' stand on GM was reflected in a 12 per cent showing in the polls, but they were caught in a backlash against a new book that alleged the Government had covered up the accidental importation of GM corn early in its term. Many suspected the Greens had known about the book and were playing 'dirty politics'.⁽³⁾ The Government proved the 'Corngate' claims were untrue, and the Greens lost nearly half their support in the campaign's last two weeks.

The focus on GM made it difficult for Labour to campaign on Clark's leadership or on Labour's record in government. It also overshadowed more traditional election issues, such as the economy. However, despite GM's high media profile, polls showed that voters were more concerned with health, education, and personal and cultural security issues, such as crime, race and immigration. New Zealand First leader Winston Peters successfully translated these into what the media termed a 'three-fingered salute' of law and order, the Treaty of Waitangi and immigration.

	Party vote (per cent)	Electorate seats	List seats	Total seats
Labour	41.3	45	7	52
National	20.9	21	6	27
NZ First	10.4	1	12	13
ACT NZ	7.1	0	9	9
Green Party	7.0	0	9	9
United Future	6.7	1	7	8
Progressive Coalition	1.7	1	1	2
Total	95.1	61	59	120

Results

Major parties: Labour won 41.3 per cent of the vote and, while it failed to obtain an outright majority, its share of the party vote increased to its highest level for 15 years. National's election result of 21 per cent (27 seats) was the party's worst outcome in its 66-year history.

Minor parties: New Zealand First increased its share of the vote from 4.3 per cent in the 1999 election to 10.4 per cent, and doubled its seats from six to 13. United Future went from 1.1 per cent support at the beginning of the campaign to finish with 6.7 per cent of the vote after its leader, Peter Dunne, gave a 'worm-winning' performance in a televised leaders' debate. Its eight seats gave it considerable power in post-election talks with Clark, who, in return for support on confidence and supply, conceded a Commission for the Family and a stay on the legalisation of cannabis. The Greens claimed seven per cent of the vote and nine seats, as did ACT New Zealand.

Overall, male domination of New Zealand First and United Future party lists contributed to a fall in the number of women in Parliament for the first time in 20 years. Of 120 MPs, 34 are women, down from 37.⁽⁴⁾ The number of Maori MPs increased from 16 to 19, with the proportion (15 per cent) similar to that in the population. Clark's 28-member executive, the largest since 1990, includes six Maori MPs and one who is openly gay.

MMP Effects

The election was the third under the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) electoral system, and came after a 2001 select committee review was unable to agree on whether MMP should be retained as it is, whether the number of MPs should be reduced to 99, or whether there should be another referendum on the system. Since MMP was introduced in 1996, there has been no single-party majority government.

Three weeks before the election, the Electoral Commission claimed that many people did not understand MMP, under which voters get two votes: one for a local candidate and one for a party.⁽⁵⁾ However, voters proved to be canny with a system that few allegedly understood, 'splitting' their votes to achieve their desired outcomes. That is, rather than giving 'two ticks' to a party (for the candidate and for the party), voters 'split' their votes between parties. National was the victim of this strategic voting, losing the party vote to Labour in 16 of the 22 electorate seats that it won (i.e. the National candidate won the electorate seat, but the party vote went to Labour). The aim may have been to boost Labour at the expense of the Greens, thus reducing the influence of the Greens on a minority Labour government.

Under MMP, the number of parties in Parliament has increased. This year there are seven: two in coalition, one in support and four in Opposition. An unexpected consequence of this has been debate over entitlements to Opposition front-bench seats. In response to fears of MPs making an unseemly dash for these seats, the Speaker allocated National only seven of the 14 Opposition front-row seats.

Into the Future

The Government: The surprise success of United Future effectively reduced the power of the Greens, in that it gave Labour an alternative partner and eliminated the possibility of the Green's being able to enforce their ultimatum over the GM moratorium. However, the deal with United Future may slow some of Labour's proposed social reforms.⁽⁶⁾ Dunne's voting record in the past two parliaments is closer to National than Labour, and his MPs are likely to take conservative positions on economic and moral issues.

The Opposition: Speculation that National's poor showing means it is finished as a major party overlooks that similar comments were made about Labour in the wake of the 1996 election, when Labour won only 28 per cent of the vote. Some blame Boag for National's rout, and she has since quit. Others attribute National's defeat to its failure to distinguish its policies from those of Labour and to distance itself from its earlier unpopular policies. In a bid for a 'new face' post-election, English has cleaned out his front bench and warned that the party has to take measures to lift its performance.

Endnotes

The Alliance comprised several minor parties: the NewLabour Party, the Green Party, Manu Motuhake, the Democratic Party, and the Liberal Party.

Labour and the Alliance proposed the law after party defections in the first Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) Parliament.

Francesca Mold, 'We reaped the seeds of distrust say Greens', New Zealand Herald, 28 August 2002.

There were 35 women until United Future list MP Kelly Chal lost her seat to the next candidate on the party's list, Paul Adams, because she was not a NZ citizen.

Of Parliament's 120 seats, 69 are electorate seats and 51 are filled from party lists to match the party's share (proportion) of the party vote.

Jonathan Milne, 'United may put brake on some social reforms', The Dominion Post, 12 August 2002.