The election is too close to call, and so are a handful of the electorates that could decide it. At least five races have fewer than 500 votes between the leaders, and hundreds of thousands of special votes are still to be counted.
All voting places have been counted, but the preliminary result is far from final. The Electoral Commission estimates about 399,000 special votes are still outstanding, nearly 97,000 of them overseas and dictation votes. Specials can easily overturn a lead of a few hundred votes, and they did in 2023. Four electorates changed hands after election night that year, including Nelson, which Labour’s Rachel Boyack won by 29 votes.
Specials have also tended to help the left. In 2023, National lost two seats on the official count, while Te Pāti Māori gained two and the Greens gained one.
The stakes are higher this time. With no list seats, every electorate National wins or loses changes the size of Parliament, and any Māori seat that flips moves Te Pāti Māori’s overhang too. On preliminary results, the coalition has 67 seats in a projected 131-seat House, one more than the 66 needed to govern.
For the candidates in the tightest races, and for the parties trying to form a government, the wait goes on until official results come out on November 27.
Here are the closest races.
Wairarapa - 139 votes
Incumbent National MP Mike Butterick is clinging to a slim lead, finishing on 17,943 votes to Kieran McAnulty, Labour’s campaign chair, on 17,804. Three years ago Butterick beat McAnulty by 2816 votes to take the seat from Labour.
NZ First's Ron Mark picked up 3555 votes, while the Greens' Lauren Craig took 1098.
The lead changed hands several times on election night, and special votes could decide the seat.
Wellington Bays - 140 votes
One of the capital’s new electorates came in a single vote behind Wairarapa. Labour’s Craig Renney, an economist and former director of policy at the Council of Trade Unions, finished on 15,307 votes. Incumbent Green MP Julie Anne Genter had 15,167.
The race was a straight left-on-left fight. National’s Karunā Muthu was a distant third on 5550 votes, and Opportunity’s Kayla Kingdon-Bebb had 2115.
Genter won the old Rongotai seat by 2717 votes in 2023, but the newly drawn Wellington Bays has been much tighter, taking in parts of Mount Cook and Brooklyn.
Both candidates led at points during Saturday’s count. Labour and the Greens are both projected to win list seats, so the result is more likely to change who holds the seat than which party governs.
Mount Roskill - 262 votes
Former Labour minister Michael Wood is trying to win back the seat he lost to National’s Carlos Cheung three years ago. Wood finished election night on 13,582 votes to Cheung’s 13,320.
A win would complete a comeback for Wood. He resigned from Cabinet in 2023 after failing to properly declare shareholdings that created conflicts of interest.
The seat matters to National, too. With no projected list MPs, a Cheung win on specials would give National another electorate and make Parliament bigger still.
Te Tai Tokerau - 436 votes
The northern Māori electorate was a four-way race, and it finished that way. Te Pāti Māori’s Aperahama Edwards led on 8484 votes, ahead of the Greens’ Hūhana Lyndon on 8048. Lyndon had been narrowly ahead in pre-election polling.
Labour’s Willow-Jean Prime was third on 6209 votes. Former MP Mariameno Kapa-Kingi was fourth on 4059. She won the seat for Te Pāti Māori in 2023 but quit the party and stood this year for her own Te Tai Tokerau Party.
Te Pāti Māori is projected to win more electorates than its party vote entitles it to. If the seat changes hands, the overhang changes with it.
Hamilton East - 456 votes
National’s Ryan Hamilton won Hamilton East by 5060 votes in 2023. This time he finished on 14,139 votes to Labour candidate Georgie Dansey’s 13,683.
The pair swapped the lead several times through election night before Hamilton finished in front. A Dansey win on specials would cut National’s electorate tally and take a seat off the size of the House.
Hutt South - 889 votes
Hutt South is not as close as the others, but it could decide the future of one of National’s most senior ministers. Labour’s Ginny Andersen finished on 17,957 votes to Chris Bishop’s 17,068. In 2023, Bishop held the seat by 1332 votes.
With National projected to win no list seats, Bishop must overturn that deficit, or gain from a change in the final list allocation, to return to Parliament.
The Electoral Commission will release official results on November 27, after special votes are counted and ordinary votes are checked and recounted.
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