The page has the main candidates for each electorate. It now also has a spreadsheet which lists the electorate candidates for the smaller parties, and the party lists for those parties that have announced them. This will be updated approximately weekly.

Labour have found a couple more victims for seats, but still have a few unfilled. At this stage I have no known Labour candidates for Hunua, Ikaroa-Rawhiti, Tamaki and Tauranga.

UPDATE: Labour this morning announced that their Tauranga candidate is Deborah Mahuta-Coyle. I guess they were incapable of finding anyone with an actual connection to Tauranga to stand. Deborah works in the Goffice as a press secretary and the closest they can do in linking her to Tauranga is saying:

Although not originally from Tauranga, Deborah grew up further along State Highway 1 in the small town of Huntly

Hilarious. Almost as funny as this:

“Deborah is dynamic, skilled, hardworking candidate- who will do her best to represent Labour in the Tauranga electorate and if given the chance, will strongly represent Tauranga as their MP after the general election”, Moira Coatsworth said.

Deborah is one of Labour’s better candidates, but to suggest she can win Tauranga is lunacy.

UPDATE2:

Whale points out that Tauranga is of course nowhere near SH1.

John Hartevelt at Stuff reports:

Do National Party candidates have an uncanny knack for having precisely the same thoughts? Or is it a case of words being put in to their mouths?

Since the party started picking new candidates in February, at least eight have issued press statements with exactly the same quotes throughout.

Even veteran broadcaster Maggie Barry and former press secretary Paul Goldsmith have been among those parroting identical party lines.

Labour’s campaign chair Trevor Mallard said any ”fill in the blanks” type press statements were ”subject to ridicule”.

”It’s a sign of both laziness and also disrespects the electorate on the part of the candidate,” Mallard said. 

Oh my God, National uses a template press release to announce a new candidate. Shock, horror.

One should understand the context of these press releases. National holds a democratic selection meeting with a secret ballot determining the winner. Hence, unlike Labour, Head Office does not know the winner in advance.

Once a winner is known, around an hour later the party generally sends out a press release. Now of course this is pre-written by a staffer. The winning candidate’s name is stuck in, and they are asked to approve it. They amend and/or approve it and it goes out – sometimes within half an hour of the decision being known.

Having the candidate write their own release from scratch at 10 pm is a rather unrealistic proposition, especially as most successful candidates at that time are off to a place with alcohol to celebrate them winning the nomination.

But I congratulate Labour on discovering the use of press release templates.

• Hunua
• Ikaroa-Rawhiti
• Tamaki
• Taupo
• Tauranga
• Waikato

Does anyone know if those seats have actually been selected, or when they are scheduled to be?

Labour’s leadership & council have selected David Parker for Epsom & told other prospectives to butt out.

Parker was the MP for Otago from 2002 to 2005 but lot it to Jacqui Dean. His new partner works for an Auckland Labour List MP, so a move to Auckland is certainly plausible.

Interesting to be in a party where the leadership decide selections. Epsom’s selection for National was determined entirely by 60+ local grassroots members.

Labour started their candidate selection much earlier and ranked their party list a couple of months ago. But they have yet to select candidate for ten or so seats. Now this is unusual with just 20 weeks to go. I suspect in some seats they are finding it hard to get a candidate as they have no chance of winning, and as the list is already ranked they can’t even offer a place as a consolation.

As far as I know (let me know if wrong), Labour are yet to select for:

1. Epsom
2. Hunua
3. Ikaroa-Rawhiti
4. Kaikoura
5. Selwyn
6. Tamaki
7. Taupo
8. Tauranga
9. Waikato

Who will they be?

The list is copied below and shows the two or three major candidates in each seat. A third party candidate is shown below only if they have a realistic chance of winning the seat and/or are a current MP.

If a candidate/MP has a personal website, I’ve linked it to their name.

If for any electorate you know the name of a missing candidate, and/or a website address for a candidate, you can e-mail that info to me for updating.

Please note that if a National MP is not listed, it is because to the best of my knowledge they have not been officially re-selected as a candidate yet. I’m only adding names on once they are officially selected.

The Queensland opposition leader says it’s entirely appropriate that candidates hoping to run for his party take intelligence tests.

Would-be Liberal National Party candidates are being given New Age intelligence tests to gauge if they are smart enough to be politicians.

The psychometric tests specifically measure aptitude, rather than concentrating on personality traits.

Psychometric tests are also used by big businesses and measure a person’s ability to think quickly and employ their knowledge from past experiences.

Opposition Leader John-Paul Langbroek said the tests would mean better leaders for the state.

“I make absolutely no apologies for trying to get the best possible LNP candidates for the next state election,” Langbroek said in a statement.

“The aptitude tests are the same type of testing that many companies use when hiring their executives and it’s entirely appropriate that we do everything we can to give the people of Queensland the best possible representatives.”

I think this is a great idea. Parties need to be more professional with candidate selection.

As well as IQ and psychometric testing, I’d also make it compulsory for would be candidates to take the political compass test, to ensure they are in the right party!

There are some real stars lining up to be candidates – several of them already well known in their own right. One of them even had a file crew following them about for a special feature on her. Won’t name them all here, as I may offend anyone I accidentally leave out, but I am quite excited by the calibre of those seeking to join the ranks of caucus.

And I do think Labour has made a big blunder by not rejuvenating more. Their only retirements are Lynne Pillay and Pete Hodgson. Maybe they can’t find people to stand? In Invercargill their candidate is Lesley Soper who has stood and lost more times than I have had hot dinners.

It is a challenging column to write as I could over-excite the male readership in having them believe that I find women attractive, empirical evidence proves this actually does little harm to a woman’s chances with the opposite sex. But refusing to engage in faux celesbianism, I shall analyse from the perspective of how women choose their men in New Zealand, not solely for physical attraction, but power, status and general usefulness at home.

So who does Cactus declare the hottest candidate:

The worst part of this column was going to be declaring that the winner of the hottest female candidate has to be Helen Clark. She’s been the most powerful person in the country for nine years, has interfered in your lives, told you not to smack your children, stole a third of your income, given some of it back and expected thanks then persuaded with minimal charm and maximum control to get you to vote her in once and back for two more thrashings. Not content with that she has the “charisma” to turn around and call the other guy untrustworthy, controlling and a domestic bully.

So Helen wins!

My candidates page has been very popular, especially as some parties have not listed candidates on their main sites. But at present it only includes the two major parties plus room for one third party candidate if they look like they could win the seat.

If anyone has a few hours spare, it would be really useful to collate up into an excel spreadsheet the names of the candidates in all 70 electorates for the following parties:

1. National
2. Labour
3. Maori
4. ACT
5. NZ First
6. United Future
7. Progressive
8. Kiwi
9. Family
10. Pacific

Also would be useful to have the ranked lists for each party. I have some of them in HTML on the existing page but if someone collates them into Excel, then I can publish them side by side.

If you”d be keen to do this, drop me an e-mail and I’ll send you the template.

1. Peter Dunne
2. Judy Turner
3. Denise Krum
4. Graeme Reeves
5. Selio Solomon
6. Murray Smith
7. Neville Wilson
8. Frank Owen
9. Janet Tuck
10. Karuna Muthu

I don’t know Selio Solomon, but can comment on Denise Krum and Graeme Reeves. Denise is UFNZ Party President and seems quite an able sort. She did quite well appearing for UFNZ for the broadcasting allocations.

Graeme Reeves was National MP for Miramar from 1990 to 1993. He was a good MP then, and would be again today. Plus I always have a soft spot for Graeme as he took the lead in Caucus in the early 1990s in expelling a certain W Peters from the Caucus.

So if the election saw United Future get up to four MPs, I’d have no problem with that – so long as they don’t take votes from the centre-right only.

When the National Party published its candidate list on Sunday a greater ethnic diversity was immediately apparent. Six Maori, three Asians and a Pacific Islander have been placed high enough on the list to get into Parliament if National polls as well as it expects.

I am guilty of this myself, but I amused how Asians are all lumped together, when in fact in winnable places are a Chinese, a Korean and an Indian Sikh. All quite different races and cultures. But hey as I said, I do it myself sometimes.

Samoan Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, Korean-born Melissa Lee and Indian Kanwal Bakshi can probably count on joining Pansy Wong, too long National’s solitary representative of immigrant communities.Indeed, she has been almost a solitary Asian voice in Parliament, for Labour has supplied only the Pakistani Ashraf Choudhary, who has been practically silent, and the smaller parties have offered no seats to non-Maori minorities.

Is Choudary still an MP? My goodness.

National’s list, incidentally, still looks light on women; only four rank in the top 24, from which a cabinet would be likely to be drawn.

There is still some way to go. It looks like women will comprise 26% to 28% of National’s caucus, much the same as is currently the case. This is more than double the international average for female parliamentary representation. The problem is not so much where women are placed on the list, but that not enough stand to be a candidate. I may touch on this at some later stage.

As for the top 24, it would be very foolish to assume that the top 24 are automatically the Ministerial pool.

Though only one Maori, Georgina te Heuheu, ranks in the top 24, three more, Tau Henare, Hekia Parata and Paula Bennett, are in positions for an almost certain return to Parliament and two others, Rugby Union director Paul Quinn and Tauranga prosecutor Simon Bridges, will make it if National wins 60 seats. Six of 60 would be an advance on the present three of 48.

It is possible that after the election National will have more Maori MPs than Labour.

Now the nominal list by itself is only a partial picture. One has to look at the “Effective List” to work out who may come in when. The Effective List is the likely List MPs, after taking account of those who will win their electorate seats.

Now let us assume the 29 candidates who already are Electorate MPs will retain their seats. Let us also assume Amy Adams will win Selwyn (replaces Rakaia which is ultra safe National) and Simon Bridges will win Selwyn Tauranga (based on Colmar Brunton poll).

Which other candidates may win their seats? Well there are no public polls in those seats, but I did calculate an electoral pendulum back in May which calculates what seats would fall on a standard swing. The swing never is standard of course, so these are not predictions – just an assumption on the best public data there is. The One News Colmar Brunton is the only poll which asks how people will vote on the electorate vote, and in July it had a gap between National and Labour of 15%. Now on the electoral pendulum this would see the following seats picked up:

1. Taupo (Louise Upston)
2. Rotorua (Todd McClay)
3. Otaki (Nathan Guy)
4. Hamilton West (Tim Macindoe)
5. West Coast-Tasman (Chris Auchinvole)
6. Palmerston North (Malcolm Plimmer)
7. Auckland Central (Nikki Kaye)
8. New Plymouth (Jonathan Young)

So assuming National wins 39 electorate seats, you then ask how many seats National would win overall based on its party vote. Now we do not know what vote National will get, but let us go off the date and time weighted average of recent polls at curiablog which has National at 50.9%. One also then needs to work out what National’s share of the effective vote is, eliminating the parties that fail to qualify for representation. At present the minnows get 1.1% and NZ First 4.4% which means 5.5% is wasted. National’s effective vote is 50.9%/(100% – 5.5%) = 53.9%. This would get National 64 MPs in total and on the assumptions above 39 electorate MPs, and 25 list MPs.

Now NZ First is close to 5% and if they make it, that will have an effect, so in the table below I’ll do two columns. The first showing what percentage of the party vote is needed for a candidate to come in off the list if NZ First do not make it (and wasted vote is 5.5%) and if NZ First do make it (and wasted vote is say 1% as it was in 2005).

Now once again this is not a prediction. This is a scenario based on publicly available polls. I am not saying National will win 65 seats, nor am I predicting what electorate National will win. I am reflecting the current public poll data.

Now let us look at some of the individual winners, before we look at the overall possible Caucus.

Caucus are all in the top 50, which will be pleasing to them. Unless National drops below 43% (if NZ First do not make it) or 45% (if NZ First do make it), all MPs will be returned.

Of the 2005 intake, the top ranked are Chris Finlayson and Tim Groser who are ranked 14 and 15, which is no 2 and no 3 on the effective list. Next is Tau Henare at 26 (7), Jonathan Coleman  29 and Kate Wilkinson at 30 (8).

Of the new candidates, Steven Joyce is in a league of his own at no 16 (4). Then four new candidates are placed in the 30s, above some MPs and guaranteed of entry so long as National polls as well as last time. They are Sam Lotu-Iiga, Hekia Parata, Melissa Lee and Kanwal JS Bakshi.

After the top 50, you have seven mainly relatively young candidates in Simon Bridges, Amy Adams, Louise Upston, Todd McClay, Tim Macindoe, Aaron Gilmore and Nikki Kaye. On the standaed pendulum, most of them will win their seats and not need the list place.

After them making up the 50s is Cam Calder, Conway Powell and Stephen Franks, all in winnable places. In fact few positions are not winnable on current polls (which is why six extra list only candidates were added onto the bottom of the list as an insurance policy in case National got more than 67 MPs. The Fairfax poll yesterday would have it receive 70 MPs. Roy Morgan however would have only 58 MPs.

So what does the next National caucus look like? Well on the current public polls average, it would be a caucus of 65 with:

• 17 female MPs (26%)
• 13 MPs under 40 (20%)
• 7 Maori MPs (11%)
• 1 Pacific MP
• 3 Asian MPs

What if things tighten up? What would it be if NZ First do make it, and National gets say 47%? That would be a caucus of 57 with:

• 17 female MPs (29%)
• 11 MPs under 40 (19%)
• 6 Maori MPs (10%)
• 1 Pacific MP
• 3 Asian MPs

Under either scenario it will be a relatively diverse caucus, with a lot of new talent coming through.

… the parliamentary party’s future looks brighter now than for a very long time. That is not because National is streets ahead in the polls and odds-on to lead the next government. It is because there is an impressive crop of late-20s to early-40s new candidates: Nikki Kaye, 28, in Auckland Central, part-Maori Simon Bridges, 31, in Tauranga, Amy Adams in Selwyn, Sam Lotu-Iiga of Maungakiekie and Louise Upston in Taupo, all 37, Todd McClay, 39, in Rotorua, and Michael Woodhouse in Dunedin North and Melissa Lee, both 42, on the list.

Most of these hold multi-degrees, some with first-class honours, and have useful life experience. In intellectual potential they look more like a Labour intake than a traditional National one. Add Harvard- and Oxford-alumna Hekia Parata, 49, and media mogul and campaign chair Steven Joyce, 45.

The class of 2008 looks to be indeed a good one. I just hope as many of them make it in as possible.

So when National ranks its list on Saturday it has rich pickings. A Prime Minister Key reshuffling cabinets would have quality replacements for old lags he could not avoid initially appointing.

Indeed. If National wins in 2008, I would not expect initial Ministers to serve a full nine years (if re-elected). Rejuvenation is key and I would not be surprised if by 2011 the majority of Cabinet is taken from the classes of 2005 and 2008.

The message to Labour when it does its list on August 30 is that to stay competitive it will not be able to afford passengers. That is a crunch test for Clark.

Labour have a real challenge. Will they protect incumbent MPs as they usually do, or put enough new blood higher up the list, so that they will come in even if they get a poor result.

Sent in by a reader. Would make a great billboard in real life!

Steven will be a very popular choice – he played a key role in the 2005 campaign which lifted National’s vote by 18% or so, and is an incredibly capable and talented individual.  He is also the Chair of the 2008 Campaign Committee so this gives him an incentive to get a really good result!

Melissa Lee is a member of the APN Board of Directors. And no before the conspiracy theorists get excited, that is not APN Media but the Asia-Pacific Producers Network.  Ms Lee is the host of Asia Downunder and has 20 years of broadcastign and journalism experience.

Steven also has a background with broadcasting – In the late 80s he co-founded and then became CEO of what is now Radioworks NZ Limited, building it up over 14 years to a sharemarket capitalization in excess of $100 million.

Tracking down candidates is not that easy. National now have them all on their website, but Labour don’t list any candidates who are not MPs (they can’t as their site is taxpayer funded).

ACT list only eight candidates at this stage. I’ve actually met them all!

The Maori Party do not seem to list candidates at all, like Labour. And the NZ First candidates are even more secret than their donations.

United Future have the most helpful list so far. They have 22 candidates to date.

The Greens have a list of candidates, but ordered by list ranking, not electorate. 48 selected to date.

The Progressive Party has only one candidate

What I thought I would cover is how it varies from the list the hierarchy drew up, and sent to the members. Not a lot of changes (ie most people ranked them in the order supplied) but a few:

1. David Clendon up from 11 to 10 (+1)
2. Gareth Hughes down from 10 to 11 (-1)
3. Mikarere Curtis down from 13 to 16 (-3)
4. Quentin Duthie from from 14 to 15 (-1)
5. Rick Leckinger down from 15 to 17 (-2)
6. Mojo Mathers up from 16 to 13 (+3)
7. Jon Carapiet dropped out (was 17)
8. Donna Wynd down from 18 to 20 (-2)
9. Jeanette Elley up from 19 to 18 (+1)
10. Richard Green dropped out (was 20)
11. Virginia Horrocks up from 21 to 19
12. James Redwood down from 22 to 23 (-1)
13. David Hay up from 23 to 21 (+2)
14. Diana Mellor up from 25 to 22 (+3)
15. Jan McGlachlan up from 26 to 25 (+1)
16. Mike Ward up from 27 to 14 (+13)

Mike Ward is the one who has changed most. Obviously the party members think a lot more of him than the hierarchy do. It will be interesting if will will roll over and allow Russel Norman to leapfrog him to become an MP in a few weeks.

On current polling the Greens would get seven MPs. Some months up to nine. So the likely Caucus at this stage is:

1. Jeanette Fitzsimons
2. Russel Norman
3. Sue Bradford
4. Metira Turei
5. Sue Kedgley
6. Keith Locke
7. Kevin Hague
8. Catherine Delahunty (possible)
9. Kennedy Graham (possible)

So far there have been three ballots, and it is down to the final ballot between Amy Adams and Alex McKinnon. This is pretty much a win-win as both of them are exceptional candidates, and someone at the meeting described one of their speeches as “Prime Ministerial” and the other as “Outstanding”.

I’ll update with the final result when known. There are several hundred voting delegates so it can take a while to count the votes.

UPDATE: Amy Adams won on the fourth and final ballot. Huge congratulations to Amy and commiserations to all the others – great to have such a good contest with so many good candidates. The big winner is actually the residents of Selwyn who are going to get a superb MP.

Amy is a bit of a super-woman. She is in her 30s and manages to be a mum to two kids, a lawyer, a lobbyist for the NZ Health Trust, helps with the farm, chairs the local school board of trustees, is a director of various companies and oh yeah is training for triathlons.

It has been great to see so many good people being selected as candidates.