Waikato
The Waikato seat replaces Piako, held by Lindsay Tisch. Tisch won it in 1999 as Karapiro with a 5,216 majority. Before that it was held by John Luxton.
In 2002 as Piako Tisch beat Sue Morony by 1,621 and in 2005, extended his majority over Moroney to 8,351. So not really a marginal seat. I estimate on the new boundaries the majority is 6,916.
We passed through Waikato on the way to Hamilton. Blog reader (and commenter) Tauhei Notts offered us a lunch in Morrinsville so we weant off the main track to get there. And when I say off the main track, I mean it. I love having GPS in the car but sometimes it picks obscure back country roads to travel along, and we ended up motoring through all sorts of narrow roads, bypassing all the main centres totally. Took a bit longer but meant we saw some great countryside.
Now it transpired that Tauhei Notts, despite being an ACT stalwart, is an old family friend of Labour’s Jacinda Ardern, and Jacinda has just got back from the UK the previous day. So Jacinda and her mother joined us for lunch.
Jacinda was wonderful company. She is great to talk to (especially about international politics) and was so charming that even Whale Oil was heard to comment that she is far far too nice to be in Labour (whenever Whale meets a Labour MP or candidate he likes, he just assumes they are in the wrong party rather than concede nice people can be in Labour 
. In fact one of the most amusing parts of lunch was having Jacinda politely rebuff Whale’s suggestion that she really was a Tory deep down. Considering Jacinda is the President of the International Union of Socialist Youth, her political convictions are rather firm!
What I am saying here, won’t come as a surprise to many within Labour – but Jacinda is one of their real stars. This is reflected in her stellar list ranking of 20, which would see her come in on a party vote of 25% for Labour. I suspect she will move up the ranks quickly.
She isn’t going to dent Lindsay’s majority this time. But as a native of the Waikato she will be an effective List MP for the area, and at a future election when the tide is going out rather than in for National, she could make it a close race. Definitely worth watching out for.
October 21st, 2008 at 12:06 pm
I just checked out her Labour Party profile. Is she as nice looking as her photo? Or is she hideously ugly but she’s been PhotoShoped just like her leader?
[DPF: Her looks are not really relevant, but no her photo is not photo shopped]
October 21st, 2008 at 12:10 pm
Whale is of course right DPF, the few (very few) nice people in Labour are indeed in the wrong party.
October 21st, 2008 at 12:23 pm
I don’t understand how a person can express an earnest desire to steal my income and my property rights and limit my freedom of expression and still be a “nice” person. Is it significant that so many leftists who have been described as being similarly charming came to be some of the most hated totalitarians in history?
Is there anyway that Jacinda’s programming could be short circuited? What a tragedy to see someone apparently capable of so much more to be so firmly wedded to the destructive ideology of the left. Imagine the benefit to the world if such people could be cured of the mental disease of socialism and convinced to work for liberty instead.
October 21st, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Bleh. She’s decent looking, but she’s a die hard socialist hell bent on fucking this country up. She’s got no experience in anything other than sucking up to senior party members and her lemming-like loyalty has resulted in a steady stream of promotions. She’s another career politician, and as useless as the rest of them.
October 21st, 2008 at 12:31 pm
`We passed through Waikato on the way to Hamilton’ As you do (lol).
October 21st, 2008 at 12:38 pm
“…whenever Whale meets a Labour MP or candidate he likes, he just assumes they are in the wrong party rather than concede nice people can be in Labour…”
I seem to remember Scott Simpson’s true blue father saying something similar about David Lange pre-1984 — that Lange was obviously in the wrong party. Though I’m sure he “liked” Lange in a different way than Whale “liked” Jacinda.
That said, even at the time I thought it was Muldoon who was clearly the odd man out.
[DPF: Whale has also said he liked Darren Hughes, so I wouldn't jump to assumptions about the meaning of like]
October 21st, 2008 at 12:40 pm
pdm – haha!!
Redbaiter – there may be hope – she is young and hasn’t grown up yet.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I always thought it was “We passed through Hamilton on the way to Ohakune/Wellington/Taupo/Anywhere else”
October 21st, 2008 at 1:08 pm
The best thing about Hamilton is its proximity to a range o’ places that aren’t Hamilton.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:40 pm
gazzaj (64)
As a Hastings resident who drives north from time to time. We do pass through Waikato but rarely pass through Hamilton. We either take highwy 27 from Trau to Pokeno or the Cambridge/Taupiri bypass. If travelling from our daughters who lives near Benneydale we take the bypass from Otorahanga to Ngaruawahia. Vice versa applies equally when travelling south – Hamilton is just not a city we have cause to or choose to enter.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:55 pm
President (Supreme Commissar) of the the International Union of Socialist Youth. Says it all, doesn’t it? I’m sure she really is nice just a these commie fuckers smile as they twist the knife into the economy.
October 21st, 2008 at 2:13 pm
“Whale has also said he liked Darren Hughes”
Crikey, there’s really no hope for the lad now , is there.
Does that means the end of all the ginga jokes?
October 21st, 2008 at 2:28 pm
So the socialist bent on taking away our freedoms and stealing our money smiled and complimented DPF on something trivial, so that’s alright then is it? We can give up our objections to her frantic scheming to turn New Zealand into a prison state because she passed the sugar when asked to? Makes me want to puke. She is another Klarke in the making.
[DPF: These comments puzzle me. I'm not sure if you are suggesting one should not have friends or be friendly to people whose politics may differ to your own - but if so that is quite sad]
October 21st, 2008 at 6:06 pm
That lunch somehow reminds me of several held by a woman of similar attractions called Mata Hari. Perhaps your MS Ardern was likewise engaged for the sisterhood.
October 21st, 2008 at 8:58 pm
The women in my home have instructed me to reply that it was a real pleasure to have Jacinda and her mother join Whale Oil and DPF for lunch.
Pushmepullu; the women of the Hellenes rarely have sugar on the table to be passed.
My daughters are interested to see that the comments regarding Jacinda on this blog in no way approach her level of intelligence, open mindedness and level headedness. Unlike the Green fanaticists, who say they care so much about the planet but spend so little time upon it, Jacinda has her feet firmly on the ground.
davidp; to confirm your enquiry, although you may find Jacinda’s politics abhorrent, her looks are nothing of the sort. She is a particularly fine young woman, but there is no getting away from this fact;
“She is a member of a disturbingly dishonest poliltical party.”
But, we all still love her.
She is certainly way above that slag who campaigned for Labour here in 1975.
October 21st, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Tauhei, can you please ask the nice Ms Adhern why she doesn’t state explicity in her profile on Labour08 that she is President of the International Union of Socialist Youth instead of the warm and fuzzy but very vague “President of an International Youth organisation”
Is she not proud of her Socialist associations or is it simply a continuation of the typical leftie tradition of deception by omission exemplified by Rochelle Rees of leaving out relevant information that may be construed by the electorate as less than constructive?
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:15 am
Did she pick the wrong time to become a member of parliament or what?
Nine years of unattained ambitions. Sitting in opposition and achieving not much, well apart from drawing an MP’s salary.
Anyone predicting she’ll still be in parliament in 2017? If “Jacinda is one of their real stars” I predict she’ll burn out within two terms. It’s good to see New Zealand lumbered with this deadweight loss rather than the UK. I laugh at this wastrels pending disappointment.
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:35 am
socialist youth? Is that like relying on their parents largesse? Or youth who have parents who are on the dole?
October 22nd, 2008 at 2:31 pm
My time working abroad…as President of an International Youth organisation, has shown me how much we have achieved relative to other countries.
Yep, we’ve gone backwards at twice the rate they have.