Dr. Geoffrey Miller

Strategic analyst

geoffreymiller.info Blog

Politics

Vote first here!

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] For those of you who can’t wait to cast your vote on November 8, make sure you cast your vote in Douglas to Dancing‘s poll on ACT’s party vote on the sidebar at left. There are six days to go. In the question I ask “realistically” what percentage of the party vote ACT will get. I thought this could be overwhelmed by ACT supporters hoping the party will get “7% or more” – but a check just now found that of the 12 votes cast (a modest success given the niche appeal of this blog), the most popular...

Politics

MMP – it takes just TWO ticks

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] Amidst a lot of the usual pap there are some good gems of information in a Steve Braunias article in today’s Sunday Star-Times. The setting is the campaign trail in Hide’s Epsom electorate: Hide, 51, leader of the Act Party, MP for Epsom, moved along the pavement with pretty little steps and a winning smile on his tanned, tight-skinned dial. He asked: “Vote for me?” He handed out Act leaflets. Few resisted. Many welcomed the chance to shake his hand. He was among friends; when Hide won Epsom in the last election, he beat his opponent, National’s Richard...

Politics

TV debates: MMP, not FPP

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] News that Helen Clark and John Key are refusing to debate each other with other party leaders has understandably been received with anger by Rodney Hide. Television debates are a major platform for small party leaders to put forward their case to voters. Excluding leaders other than from National or Labour devalues votes given to small parties and only encourages the mistaken view that New Zealand has a presidential system, rather than a proportional, MMP environment. Hide performs well in debates and will be annoyed that he will be robbed of a potential opportunity to swing voters from...

Politics

Wong way to do things

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] National MP Pansy Wong’s attack on Kenneth Wang, the ACT candidate in Botany, should backfire. Wong has lodged an EFA complaint against Wang on the basis that his billboards, which claim voting for Wang will net voters both Wang and Wong (because of the latter’s high list position), amounts to an unauthorised and untrue endorsement of Kenneth Wang by Pansy Wong, who has done no such thing. If mainstream-niche party competition theory, as set out by Bonnie Meguid and discussed by me earlier this year, holds, this attack should have only upside for ACT. Voters feel sympathetic to...

Politics

ACT and the financial crisis

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] With all the coverage of the financial contagion which centres on the United States, it’s sobering to recall that it is New Zealand, not the US, which has moved into a “technical recession” in the past week, having suffered two consecutive quarters of negative growth. The last time this happened was in 1998 – a fact which should give ACT pause for thought. While financial troubles are not normally something to be embraced with glee, ACT should actually profit electorally from the economic uncertainty. In 1998, the year of the last recession (which took place amidst the Asian...

Politics

Update: Simon Walker

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] I mentioned Simon Walker in my post on targeting New Zealand voters abroad. Walker was included in ACT newsletters during its start-up phase in the mid-1990s as the party’s London contact. Walker edited the 1989 book Rogernomics: Reshaping New Zealand’s Economy, a collection of articles in favour of the economic reforms began five years earlier by the then Minister of Finance and later ACT co-founder, Sir Roger Douglas. Mr. Walker has since contacted me to say that he is still an ACT party member and supporter. Indeed, he appears to still be living in London and is the...

Politics

Update: targeting voters abroad

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] Many thanks to Stephen who posted some interesting information as a comment to yesterday’s post on the difficulties of targeting New Zealand voters abroad. According to an expat organisation called Kea New Zealand, which is running a campaign called “Every Vote Counts”, only around 28,000 of 500,000 New Zealanders living abroad who are eligible to vote actually do so, which I think is a staggering statistic. As for the motives behind the campaign, according to Kea: Every Vote Counts is strictly non-partisan, and does not advocate that expatriates vote for any particular political party or candidate, nor hold...

Politics

Targeting voters abroad

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] Finding on my return that the election was so close was something of a surprise – November 8 is certainly not far away! For voters abroad such as myself, it will be even sooner. I received a letter from Elections NZ advising me on how to vote from overseas and it looks like the easiest way will be to download and fax my voting papers back to New Zealand – from two and a half weeks prior to the actual day. A figure I’ve heard quoted before is that there are some one million New Zealanders living overseas....

Politics

Normal service resumes?

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] After an extended break, I’m back and hope to provide some useful commentary on ACT in the election campaign. From now on I will try to make posts more timely and topical and move away from the extended, but irregular analysis pieces which I preferred earlier in the year. Expect Douglas to Dancing to be more concise and follow the news agenda more closely from now on, although I’ll still try to provide original material and comments not available elsewhere (the unique selling point of any blog). I can’t promise daily updates, but will attempt to provide commentary...

Politics

ACT List 2008: announcement 11am on Wednesday

[text-blocks id=”act-party”] Being away I can’t promise any immediate commentary, but check all the usual places for details at 11am on Wednesday, especially the ACT website: www.act.org.nz.

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