Assessing my political punditry skills
09.17.05 (12:33 pm) [edit]
Last week, eight days out from the New Zealand general election, I put on my political pundit's hat and had a crack at predicting what would happen. Now that the results are in, though we don't yet know what the make-up of the government will be, I thought I'd do a little assessment of how I got on. I'll do the same regarding my German election predictions once the results are in for that one tomorrow night or on Monday. Anyway, here goes:
1. Labour will get the higher percentage of the party vote, but not by much.
Tick, A+. Labour got 40.74% of the vote, just 1.11% more than National.
2. Labour will form a centre-left government in coalition with the Greens and the Progressives.
Uncertain at this stage, though the signs are good. Either the Maori Party or New Zealand First will have to be involved somewhere for Labour to be able to govern, but this may be by way of a less formal agreement than actual coalition partnership. With the jury still out on this, I'm going to give myself a tentative tick at this stage.
3. Helen Clark, current NZ Prime Minister, will remain PM but will stand down well before the next election, thus going out on a high, rather than risk being rolled after fighting a fourth, losing election campaign in 2008.
Remains to be seen. It looks good for her retaining the Prime Minister's job at this stage though.
4. Voter turnout will be extremely high.
Bang on. Official figures for voter turn out have not been released yet as far as I can tell, but this Herald on Sunday article suggests that turnout was probably in the high 80s. It won't have been close to the record 96% turnout in 1938, but it sounds like it was high enough for me to give myself full marks on this the easiest of my predictions.
5. Winston Peters, leader of the racist and bigoted New Zealand First Party, will not hold his Tauranga electorate seat, nor will his party reach the 5% threshold required for list candidates to get in to parliament. This, thank goodness, will mean the end of the party.
One out of three. Damn, damn, damn. Winnie didn't hold his seat (that's my one correct prediction), but his party did break the 5% barrier and will have 7 MPs in the next parliament, including, (alas! alack!) Winston Peters. Bugger!
6. ACT, the right-wing, economically Liberal party, will neither win an electorate seat (Epsom is the only one even in the frame, and it won't happen) nor reach the 5% threshold. This will mean the demise of that party also.
One out of three again. To my absolute astonishment, Rodney Hide - the ACT Party leader - easily won Epsom. As a result, Green MP Keith Locke may find himself havig to run naked down Auckland's main street after making a rather rash comment in public a week or so out from the election. ACT did not, however, get anywhere near the 5% threshold. But with two MPs in parliament, it'll be a while yet before the party meets its end.
7. Don Brash, leader of the National Party, and his campaign strategist, Murray McCully, will be the ones who (rightly) take the rap for botching what was looking a very promising campaign through incompetence, uncertainty and (though I hate to use the word) flip-flops. McCully will be binned as strategist and Don Brash will be rolled as leader within a year after the election.
Have to wait and see on this. I have a year's time for this one to come about. Fingers crossed.
As you can see, I can't give myself a proper score at this stage, but I'm pleased to see that at least some of my predictions where right on the button, even if a couple were rather wide of the mark. Let's see how I get on tomorrow.
1. Labour will get the higher percentage of the party vote, but not by much.
Tick, A+. Labour got 40.74% of the vote, just 1.11% more than National.
2. Labour will form a centre-left government in coalition with the Greens and the Progressives.
Uncertain at this stage, though the signs are good. Either the Maori Party or New Zealand First will have to be involved somewhere for Labour to be able to govern, but this may be by way of a less formal agreement than actual coalition partnership. With the jury still out on this, I'm going to give myself a tentative tick at this stage.
3. Helen Clark, current NZ Prime Minister, will remain PM but will stand down well before the next election, thus going out on a high, rather than risk being rolled after fighting a fourth, losing election campaign in 2008.
Remains to be seen. It looks good for her retaining the Prime Minister's job at this stage though.
4. Voter turnout will be extremely high.
Bang on. Official figures for voter turn out have not been released yet as far as I can tell, but this Herald on Sunday article suggests that turnout was probably in the high 80s. It won't have been close to the record 96% turnout in 1938, but it sounds like it was high enough for me to give myself full marks on this the easiest of my predictions.
5. Winston Peters, leader of the racist and bigoted New Zealand First Party, will not hold his Tauranga electorate seat, nor will his party reach the 5% threshold required for list candidates to get in to parliament. This, thank goodness, will mean the end of the party.
One out of three. Damn, damn, damn. Winnie didn't hold his seat (that's my one correct prediction), but his party did break the 5% barrier and will have 7 MPs in the next parliament, including, (alas! alack!) Winston Peters. Bugger!
6. ACT, the right-wing, economically Liberal party, will neither win an electorate seat (Epsom is the only one even in the frame, and it won't happen) nor reach the 5% threshold. This will mean the demise of that party also.
One out of three again. To my absolute astonishment, Rodney Hide - the ACT Party leader - easily won Epsom. As a result, Green MP Keith Locke may find himself havig to run naked down Auckland's main street after making a rather rash comment in public a week or so out from the election. ACT did not, however, get anywhere near the 5% threshold. But with two MPs in parliament, it'll be a while yet before the party meets its end.
7. Don Brash, leader of the National Party, and his campaign strategist, Murray McCully, will be the ones who (rightly) take the rap for botching what was looking a very promising campaign through incompetence, uncertainty and (though I hate to use the word) flip-flops. McCully will be binned as strategist and Don Brash will be rolled as leader within a year after the election.
Have to wait and see on this. I have a year's time for this one to come about. Fingers crossed.
As you can see, I can't give myself a proper score at this stage, but I'm pleased to see that at least some of my predictions where right on the button, even if a couple were rather wide of the mark. Let's see how I get on tomorrow.
posted by: BerlinBear (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (11:00 am)
Reply to: themarina
I was a bit disappointed actually. I thought I might have got a bit closer than that, but no. Shame. We'll have to wait and see how I got on with my predictions for the German election. As yet, everything is still up in the air.
posted by: newbie (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (6:07 pm)
Let's see how I got on:
(1. Labour will not get the higher percentage of the party vote (this from a Labour supporter), but that's because they haven't gobbled up their potential coalition partners. National will probably get around 44 percent, Labour 40, The Greens 7, Winston 5, Dunne 1, Anderton 1, Maori 1. Or thereabouts.)
Not terribly wrong. National weren't in front, of course, but with ACT the right got about 42%. I just didn't see Labour getting out in front, though. I don't think anyone did - well not until ten o'clock, anyway. Damn Peter Dunne! Because everyone thought he would put up a weak showing, he's been crowing victory since the election despite losing 3 MPs. I do wish he'd just sod right off and take his stupid little party with him.
(2. Winston WON'T win Tauranga, but it's anybody's guess whether he'll make five percent. I think he'll squeak in.)
We'll, 1 1/2 out of two. unless we call 7 percent squeaking in, then it's two. I had hoped he'd get chucked out, but it is almost impossible conceive of NZ politics without Winston anymore. Unfortunately.
3. ACT will, of course, be out. Did anyone see the old guy at the rest home asking Rodney why he didn't come around when there wasn't an election on?
The big zero, but I don't think ANYONE predicted that. I really hoped National had killed off both ACT and NZFirst. That would have made it impossible for the right to form a coherent government for the next two or three elections. Parties without natural allies simply do not get elected under MMP.
(4. On the party vote alone, National, Winston and Dunne have the numbers to form a government, but this doesn't take into account the overhang. The Maori Party is likely to win around five or six of the maori seats, without the corresponding party vote share. This means that the right will have to capture around 51 or 52 percent of the vote to form a government.)
This was my coup de grace. I'd been saying that the Maori party would be the spoiler in this election ever since Brash unleashed his third attack on Maori, and Sharples declared his party could never go with National. The ONLY commentator who picked up on the overhang was Willie Jackson, and that was only the night before the election. As it stands now, National, NZFirst and United Future have 61 seats. In a normal distribution Winnie could have reneged on his promise to go with the party with the largest number of seats in the house and the centre right would have a minority. Now, they're stuffed, and even the (ex)gnome of Tauranga won't have much influence over government policy.
I believe I deserve about 50 points for this prediction, because its fruition saved our nation.
(5. The Greens, Labour and Anderton will form a coalition, the Maori Party will support the coalition on supply and demand, but not join the government, and the others will be in opposition.)
I'm sticking by this. But Clark will probably court Winston on supply and demand to give him some insurance in case the Maoris get all uppity. I think Dunne should be hung out to dry due to the way he behaved during the campaign, but Helen will probably try and include him in the process somewhere, isolating the right.
(6. Don Brash will quit as opposition leader - he was never up to politics anyway. John Key will take his place. Murray McCully will stay on to advise Key on PR, but God alone knows why.)
We'll have to see. History is with me on this, but I'm starting to think he may well be around for some time.
7. Clark will lead the 5th Labour government into its 4th election.
I'll stick to this too, although it will be a while before it's confirmed.
So, not bad, all in all. Especially the 50 pointer.
posted by: newbie (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (6:11 pm)
Whoops. that newbie was me. And there were quite a few mistakes in there:
Winnie could have reneged on his promise to go with the party with the largest number of seats in the house and the centre right would have a majority (not minority)
posted by: secret samurai (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (6:11 pm)
Again with the newbie!
posted by: secret samurai (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (6:13 pm)
But Clark will probably court Winston on supply and demand to give her (not him) some insurance in case the Maoris get all uppity.
posted by: newbie (reply)
post date: 09.19.05 (8:05 pm)
Whoops. I meant ACT, National, NZ First and United Future have 61 seats
posted by: Kiwi in Zurich (in Paris) (reply)
post date: 09.20.05 (1:10 am)
Reply to: newbie/secretsamurai
your entire monologue all quite amusing :) well done on the overhang, even having studied the MMP system I forget that it provided that much flexibility.
posted by: BerlinBear (reply)
post date: 09.23.05 (6:25 am)
Reply to: secret samurai/newbie
Like Kiwi in Zurich, I was mused by your monologue. And as the results came in, I had noted how close you'd been with some of your predictions. I think we both did as well as could have been expected, given the circustances. Nice one mate.
posted by: BerlinBear (reply)
post date: 09.23.05 (6:27 am)
Reply to: Kiwi in Zurich
Ha! I agree completely. And yeah, agree on the overhangs as well. Of course, it's even more complicated in Germany where every state can generate its own overhangs. This time around they have (I believe) 15!
