Talk:2008 New Zealand general election

considered vulnerable?
is describing various seats as "considered vulnerable to (re)capture" weaseltalkin'? 'cause, some winner is going to come through and sow a bunch of those reference needed tags, where you have to go back and find out who considered it vulnerable, and why if it's "considered" vulnerable, why we can't say "is vulnerable". I was just wondering if people had any idea about the language of these paragraphs? Rocklaw (talk) 20:54, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't like the term "capture" in this instance. A party doesn't "capture" a seat like some sort of animal, they win the support of voters. --Lholden (talk) 03:14, 8 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Is being considered vulnerable as simple as having less than x% majority, or n vote majority? If so, a single reference to someone saying that could be found, and then a paper majority for the changed seats also needs to be referenced.- gadfium 03:19, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree with all of this. "capture" is a misnomer; for instance, Nick Smith won Nelson, but Labour hosed his party down for party votes. Who won that? And Gadfium is right, because (1) nobody did the maths on the numbers for the new seats (and probably nobody will) and (2) I don't know, do we wait for an article in the Dom from Nigel Roberts called "seats to watch" or somesuch? Is that dubious use of referencing, when we reference opinion articles? I take from all of this that the paragraph needs to be rewritten. Any ideas how? Rocklaw (talk) 11:26, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I have got data calculating majorities on the new boundaries for all 70 seats if that would be helpful. It is based on reallocating polling places to the new boundaries and proportionally allocating special votes DPF (talk) 11:38, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

last minute
Hi, I'm new here, and interested in helping make this page better. There are two things I want to talk about: 1. I would really like to have all 70 current electorates profiled (can we get maps?) before too long, maybe Easter? (of which I will gladly do a lot of the work) 2. that I would like to turn the 'marginal seats' section into a 'notable races' section, so as to avoid oversignifying electorate results (they're not super important any more)non-marginal seats. I guess, just nuts and bolts. So, yeah. hi. Rocklaw (talk) 00:08, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

snap election
what counts as a snap election? If 1984 was a snap then so was 2002, right? In which case, they aren't that rare any more. My point when I renovated the opening paragraph was to say off year snaps are ridiculously rare. I will follow it up by adding that we shouldn't get too hung up on presedence or convention, because those sorts of things are just made to be broken, especially while we're still feeling our way around the new(ish) electoral system. Kripto 21:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It seems to be generally agreed that 1984 was a snap election, and our article calls it one. I'm not sure about the 2002 election; I looked at it before updating the page. It was certainly called months earlier than it legally had to be, and some people called it a snap election, but the government said it wasn't one. I see our article snap election says 2002 was one, so I would have no objection to the lead paragraph being updated to that.- gadfium 02:02, 4 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps we should avoid discussion of snap elections in this article, since they aren't relevant here at present.- gadfium 08:51, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

I think we should thrash out a theoretical definiton of a snap election with no particular year in mind, since it is a somewhat nebulous concept. Then we can apply it with total immunity friom prosecution. I open the bidding with, one that happens before the start of spring (ca. September 1) in a usual election year. Kripto 00:37, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Heh, that's a good point actually - we don't have fixed election dates. Although, of course, I think we should... (rants about the constitution and lack thereof). However, the term "snap" implies an election called when no-one expects one. In which case only 1984 could be truly considered a snap election, as 1951 and 2002 were expected. --Lholden 02:06, 20 June 2007 (UTC)


 * "New Zealand parliaments traditionally run a full term" is either a contradiction in terms or an abuse of language, precisely because "we don't have fixed election dates". When talking of time, "term" means a defined span of time. It doesn't have to be precisely known in advance, e.g. a convict sentenced to imprisonment for "the term of his natural life", but it does have to be fixed in advance. In the Westminster System parliaments do not usually have terms at all, though they usually do have an upper limit on the interval between elections. It makes even less sense to talk of governments or ministers having terms of office, since they can span several parliaments without even a theoretical upper limit (apart from exception countries with variations to the Westminster System). 203.220.42.33 (talk) 08:55, 18 November 2007 (UTC) P.M.Lawrence.

13 seats?
John Key doesn't need to win 13 seats to govern. What bollocks. If whoever did that doesn't understand the New Zealand electoral syste and is still using FPP lingo to describe it, could they at least have the good grace not to edit pages about it? 121.73.11.43 (talk) 23:54, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
 * In order to form the government, John Key will have to gain the support of 13 MPs in addition to the current 48 National MPs (assuming no overhang). That's not FPP lingo, that's fact. --Lholden (talk) 00:02, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

The current LAB+PRO government is always ten seats short of government using this "fact" let's call it "Holden's Law". With NZF+UTD, this number falls to two short, which is why the Greens abstain on sup&conf. This means that nobody has a majority in the house - to govern, in effect, you just need more seats than the other guy. MMP's dirty little secret, and the one that I reckon the future election will blow the lid off is - the idea of a group of people being obviously and demonstrably "the government" is dead. I've always held the sneaking suspicion that the centre-right haven't quite grasped this idea, which explains (not completely, but pretty well) why they keep getting beaten. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.73.11.43 (talk) 00:30, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Ok, we'll remove it if you think it's such an issue. --Lholden (talk) 05:01, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

We shouldn't remove a section because of one guys consiparcy theory! National did need to win 13 seats to gewt a MJAORITY and I think it should be included —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.65.35.18 (talk) 22:45, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

the election funding scandal
Ten bucks says this: not one vote will be swayed by a year-old election funding scandal. In fact, if you were to ask a panel of experts what's going to be the major theme of a campaign that most likely won't be waged until next spring, they'd say they couldn't tell you, given that leaders don't like to play their policy hands too far out. In the light of that, I would suggest that we shouldn't talk about issues until closer to the time, and leave the article as a sort of skeletal look at the mechanics of not the campaign, but the electoral process itself. Kripto 22:48, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Resigning members
Taito Field is going to retire in 2006? Since when?
 * The article referenced states that he may possibly resign. --Lholden 21:57, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Speculation is highly unencyclopediac. An alien could burst out of his stomach (this is unlikely, I grant); he could be deselected (which is more likely), etc, etc. But, one thing, if we're going to speculate in lieu of any good information which isn't due until probably the middle of next year, then what about the possibility of resignations of MPs in order to stand for various mayoralties? Kripto 22:48, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Helen
Can anyone find a better free use image? Brian | (Talk) 04:07, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Someone should email each politician, asking them to licence a photo under Creative Commons so Wikipedia can use it. If that someone is in Wellington, offer to come and photograph them personally if they prefer. The page Example requests for permission might help.- gadfium 04:58, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I tried that to Govt House once, never got a reply. Brian | (Talk) 05:00, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * We also need one for Key, as the image doesn't meet free use requirements. --Lholden 07:48, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I've contacted Key's office, see if we have any luck... Brian | (Talk) 02:15, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Contacting the Members of Parliament for pictures is a good idea. Many of the MP's I know use their parliament.govt.nz email primarily so I suggest contacting them that way. Sugnaguy | (Talk) 18:30, 23 March 2008
 * The National Party has a flickr account here and all their pictures are creative commons. I don't know the rules though about this sort of thing...can we just harvest pictures freely of the people we need pictures of? Plan8sucked then (talk) 08:57, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
 * We can't use pictures posted by the National Party on flickr, because they licence them as "non-commercial" and "no derivatives", which make them insufficiently free for Wikipedia. I know they have been approached at least once to change a specific photo to an acceptable licence, but they declined. We can't use photos of living people which are under restrictive copyrights at all. There's a "fair use" argument which can be made for some photos which couldn't be replaced by free photos, but for living people, this isn't acceptable because someone should be able to take a free photo. Key is appearing in many public places daily; eventually someone will upload a free picture of decent quality of him to Wikipedia, or put it on Flickr under a suitable licence.- gadfium 09:33, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

spec u later, alligator
1. The electorate boundaries aren't of notable interest - we're stuck an an FPP hangover when we say that a close call in Otaki is noteworthy. You might as well say that Nick Smith's majority in Nelson is a sign of things to come. Where was the party vote the closest? 2. seriously, take the election fnuding thing down. You're soothsaying. You're trying to guess what the campaign will be about. Don't do that. 3. Only list the people who will retire. There's a rumour (sure I just started it, but all the same) that Paul Swain will ascend to heaven on a golden chariot too, but I take that as seriosuly as I do stories of Pete Hodgson retiring - I've heard stories of PH quitting since the day he was elected. Don't speculate. 4. Where did the picture of John Key go? Kripto 03:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
 * To answer the last question, the picture we had was fair use, but then we got a free image so the fair use one had to go. For reasons I don't understand the free image was deleted, and no one has yet reuploaded the fair use one. Actually, that's hardly an answer at all.- gadfium 06:05, 18 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I disagree about the electorate boundaries. They aren't as important as before MMP, but they're worth commenting on and this is an appropriate article.


 * I agree about the election funding and National leadership issues, and have removed that section.


 * I've removed the list of retiring MPs since that is sourced as a rumour. Marion Hobbs apparently has announced her resignation as of the end of the term, but the others were unsourced. Retiring MPs properly should go into the New Zealand general election, 2005 anyway.- gadfium 06:26, 18 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I've been trying to contact Key's office about the fair use image, which I had permission to use last time, but I haven't had any response as yet. --Lholden 07:17, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

polls
hey, I count 67 opinion polls taken since the 2005 election. That's a lot, and read as a continuous bunch of numbers, does have some semblence of validity as an indicator of trends. I don't mind updating the polling chart, that's not what bugs me, it's more...if I put all 67 polls up, and maybe a graph I don't really know how to make, (screencap?) would it be better to have this on a new page? 67 table rows is a bit big. Kripto 03:52, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * We only have about 15 polls at the moment. If you have figures for others, by all means add them. A graph would be great, but I don't know a good way to create a graph as a .png file or similar.- gadfium 06:33, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I've been thinking about generating a graph in a Open Source spreadsheet program I have, but it's a fairly complex task - e.g. do we want an aggregated poll, or individual results of parties? --Lholden 21:27, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I think a line graph will do the trick. I mean, you make a graph in openoffice, and then you take a screencap (I use kubuntu and it always saves them as as .png, so that's all sweet, nobody with a patent gets hurt) and post it as an image. I was just kinda hoping that there was a way to make wikipedia do it for me. Guess not. The second part of my question is do we want a separate page called Opinion Polling for the 2008 New Zealand General Election? Because once the election gets in full swing, (after the speculation of 2007, and the phony war that rages from February onwards) there'll be candidates, lists, results and stuff, and this can take up a lot of space. Also, I haven't been paying a lot of attention to preferred PM polls, so I don't have any. Kripto 02:37, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
 * That seems okay to me - there's an article on the US presidential elections similar to what I think you're plugging at - Opinion polling for the United States presidential election, 2008 - with a fairly complex scatter graph (although, there's multiple candidates so it's a bit of a mind twister, innit). --Lholden 02:48, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah, at least we know who's contesting our election. So if I come back in a few hours and start uploading data to a new page, then nobody is going slap a merge tag on it? Also, I'm not going to upload a scatter graph. Kripto 04:51, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I think a screen capture is probably not the optimal way of making a graph. Ask at WP:HD, someone there will be sure to know. I agree that splitting the polls out into a separate article is a good idea.- gadfium 05:15, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Summary of polls
I don't like the way this article appears to treat Opinion polling for the New Zealand general election, 2008. It should be discussed here as well, using the main article template rather than pointing to another article only. Does anyone disagree? With candidates, it's different of course, but we can certainly give a quick summary of opinion polling. Richard001 (talk) 00:38, 28 January 2008 (UTC)


 * yeah, that's fair. While we're at it, maybe we could move the non-returning candidates' names under the link for Candidates for the New Zealand general election, 2008? Rocklaw (talk) 01:05, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Election infobox
The infobox is able to handle more than two parties; I suggest that instead of summarily removing content, the existing information should be expanded. --Lholden (talk) 00:39, 27 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree if the infobox can handle more than two parties, then the box should be updated. However until that update having two parties only is distortionary. They should be removed until the full range of likely parties to be elected is put up.


 * I've reverted again ; see WP:sofixit --Lholden (talk) 01:08, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that more than two parties should go in the infobox. One of the two main parties is almost certain to form the majority party in the government after the next election. Several of the minor parties may become part of a coalition, but it is extremely unlikely at this point that any other party will gain the substantial share of the vote that the two major ones can expect. There is a natural "cut-off" point to display the two major parties; the next natural cut-off point would be to include all those parties currently in parliament (10 of them, I believe), and an argument could be made for others which have some chance of winning a seat or to take it to extremes, every party and independent candidate standing.- gadfium 01:35, 27 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I think this might be a problem peculiar to MMP... in the United Kingdom general election, 2005 article the have Govt v Opposition & third party (the Lib Dems). How about just the parliamentary partys? --Lholden (talk) 02:20, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

It seems that the infobox supports a maximum of five parties. The current arrangement has the five parties who gained the most votes in the last election in the order of percentage of votes gained. If we're going to display five parties, then this is the correct selection and order.- gadfium 03:03, 27 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The template page says it goes up to six. -Rrius (talk) 09:01, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I've added the sixth party. United Future got more votes than the Māori Party but fewer seats, so it's debatable about which order they should be in.- gadfium 01:14, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Retiring MPs
After the election some MPs will obviously be not returning so should a new article be created, Retired MPs from the 48th New Zealand Parliament or similar. Then those MPs pages could be deleted. Margaret Wilson should keep her page and maybe former Ministers or MPs with a story i.e David Benson-Pope. Any thoughts or name ideas.Tshiels1 (talk) 06:53, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Why would we delete the articles on former MPs?- gadfium 08:09, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Would they still be notable? Particularly the backbenchers.Tshiels1 (talk) 08:24, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
 * There will still be many reliable sources about their time as a backbencher. I'm thinking mainly newspaper and magazine articles. Although over the years some of these will drop off line, they are still acceptable sources. Books will be published over the next few decades on the politics of this time, and they will be a useful source of additional information. Some of the backbenchers will go on to further notable activities.


 * It would be possible to create articles on the backbenchers of previous decades, but it would take more work to find the references. Ironically, it might be easier to do for people of the 19th century than those of the mid 20th, as the earlier newspapers are out of copyright and more likely to be available online. Such articles would be linked to from earlier election articles, from the various government articles such as Second National Government of New Zealand, and from the appropriate electorate article. I'd say that writing such articles would be low on most people's priorities, but they'd be acceptable.- gadfium 19:04, 30 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, looking at the list it would be hard to decide who didn't need an article, Clem Simich was deputy speaker Katherine Rich was front bench and Bob Clarkson has a story. Most of the Labour retiring MPs are either former cabinet ministers or have a controversy it will be hard to decide. And like you say they may go on to be notable.Tshiels1 (talk) 01:24, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Notability doesn't go away. Jill Pettis is notable because at some point, she was one of the brave, the few, the noble to serve in the New Zealand House of Representatives. And so is Bob Clarkson, and so are the rest (though most of the Labour list is made up of people who were at some point in Cabinet). Also, the paragraph you refer to should be rewritten; right now we know who's retiring. In a few weeks, we're going to have to add the ones that got made redundant. plan 8 (talk) 20:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It at least doesn't disappear immediately. There is no good reason to delete any of the articles in the forseeable future. -Rrius (talk) 20:44, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't disappear at all. There is longstanding precedent that anyone ever elected to a federal state parliament, even if for a month, is notable, and I would be very surprised if any such article was ever deleted at AfD. Rebecca (talk) 11:56, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Don't delete them - if they are deleted there will be a lot of red names in the past "xxxx general election" pages (all written) and in the "xxth Parliament" pages (some written) Hugo999 (talk) 23:31, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Opinion polling
Why do you have to go to a different article to get a summary of opinion polls? Anyone heard of summary style? Richard001 (talk) 06:52, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
 * How do you propose to summarise it? This seems to be a consistent way of handling opinion polling in other election articles; if it gets too long, it gets moved to a separate article. -Rrius (talk) 07:04, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I've added the newly updated graph of opinion polls as a summary.- gadfium 07:50, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Given the snarky "Anyone heard of summary style?", I assumed he meant he was looking for something textual rather than something he could quite easily have done himself by copying and pasting. -Rrius (talk) 09:21, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

"This election is about trust" section non-neutral
The section This election is about trust makes the article unbalanced and lacking neutrality. The NZF stuff is largely factual but the National stuff is very slanted. What to do: Remove? Greatly moderate? Add anti-Labour stuff to balance the anti-National stuff? I don't favour the last - I'd rather see more substance on policies than this sort of sloganeering and insinuations. Nurg (talk) 01:42, 2 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't think either "anti-Labour" or "anti-National" wording is useful - balance is required, but not equal amounts of imbalanced statements.


 * The title quote of the section does not match the content of the paragraphs: 'Controversy' or 'Trust, Secrecy and Credibility' might be more appropriate. Also, the Winston Peters / NZ First credibility, secrecy and trust issue of of more note than those of John Key / National, having been in the media for longer, and involving more separate issues.


 * I propose the irony of ACT's Rodney Hide being found to have breached Electoral laws either be explained, or the word removed. (I agree that it is ironic, but not appropriate without explanation in this context).


 * If a balanced coverage of trust/secrecy/credibility is of interest, then a mention of Mike William's unsuccessful digging for dirt over H-Fee is as relevant as other controversies in this topic. 130.216.33.81 (talk) 23:46, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

The whole section needs a rewrite or dumping if it stays as is. It should be about this election but Paintergate was two elections ago - I can understand why there's an editwar on this section. "Trust" is an issue raised in electioneering by the Labour Party, a neutral view of the election issue is all that is needed, and Winston Peter's donation problems (as an election issue) should have a separate heading. Fanx (talk) 06:41, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree, I don't remember anyone mentioning "Paintergate" within the past half a decade.--Anon 09:08, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

I removed the entire section entitled "Trust" as it dealt with political issues from the 2002 election. I think someone simply cut and pasted this section from an old source in order to make Labour look bad (which, unfortunately for this election they needed no help doing; and please don't bollocks me - I support Labour! Paintergate was something that Winston Peters took to town and capitalized on in the 2002 polling. It had nothing to do with the incoming Nationals coalition, nor in my view with the 2008 election. 72.177.63.203 (talk) 21:22, 14 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I've re-inserted the section. It may not be neutrally written but Winston's donations were a big part of the election, and Key's shares did keep popping up also. It is better to clean this section up than to remove it. But I did remove the painting/speeding thing - I don't remember anyone ever making a point of that in this election. Also Act's office space was mentioned in the news once, but it was hardly an election issue.--Anon 21:54, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Featured article
I hope that New Zealanders (and other supporters) will demand that their 2008 general election candidates images are placed on the front page featured article, to offset any apparent American bias that has been made for the November 3 featured article. NorthernThunder (talk) 02:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
 * The relevant articles are not featured. If we had featured articles for Helen Clark and John Key, then this would be a reasonable suggestion. Otherwise, it would appear to be trolling.- gadfium 07:34, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Huh?
The infobox stats given in some kiwi MPs articles are misleading. Take Rodney Hide and Pita Sharples for examples. In the "Majority" line, Hide is given 15,251 and  42.62%. Hide's majority over Richard Worth was actually a shade over 3000. The percentage figure of course is his share of the total number of electorate votes and is nothing to do with a majority figure. Similar situation over at Sharples. He got fractionally over 2000 more electorate votes than Tamihere. Maybe if the word "Majority" was changed to "Votes" it would fix the problem. As the box is probably a template I'd ask someone with more expertise than me to do it. That would be less laborious than going to each electorate's returns, assessing the individual majorities, and then amending the infobpxes. Kaiwhakahaere (talk) 01:14, 7 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Your assumption that they are templates is correct - they are used in many countries and are also locked from editing so no change to Votes is possible. I have corrected the majorities to that shown on their electorate pages, thanks for pointing this error out. Fanx (talk) 04:09, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Election Results
This new para points out (briefly) that you neet to think about first the size of parliament (overhang) and then the number of seats needed to get a majority with MMP Hugo999 (talk) 13:54, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Images
I've just added a few images from voting today to the commons. I also took a few others today and can upload any of these if anyone wants them - SimonLyall (talk) 02:53, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Just noticed something re. colours
From a non-New Zealander perspective, is there a reason for the Labour and Maori Party colours to be so similar? They are clearly different parties, yet the colours used to identify them are close to identical. Perhaps different colours could be used. Thanks, Sarsaparilla39 (talk) 09:56, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * You'd have to ask the parties themselves about that - we're using official party colours from party logos, websites etc. - at least for major or modern parties. Fanx (talk) 10:08, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Having a quick gawk at the parties' websites, perhaps black could be used in place of red for the Maori Party. It's still one of their major colours. Just a suggestion. Sarsaparilla39 (talk) 11:19, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Black is taken by New Zealand First already, and NZF doesn't have any alternate colours. Kelvinc (talk) 11:48, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I have changed the Māori Party/meta/color from an old website colour, #D9001D , to the colour used on the logo,  #EF4A42  . Fanx (talk) 19:09, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * There are several conflicts of colours between parties in parliament and those out side (e.g. Bill & Ben & Greens, Family Party & Act). I would suggest that now NZ First is outside of parliament the Maori Party should now take precedence and have their dominant colour of Black assigned to them. This would certainly show better distinction between the parliamentary parties which I believe would go back to addressing the original concern of Sarsaparilla93 Rgiltrap (talk) 19:57, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

This is not an issue of precedence - New Zealand First's use of black isn't up for grabs, it is the official party colour and even if the party disappears completely off the radar it should stay as is. The predominant colour of the Māori Party is red - it is a traditional Māori colour as as such it represents much more than the party's presence on wikipedia. The use of party colours on wikipedia is primarily to represent their corporate identity, not to make life easy for wikipedia readers, although where clear conflicts arise secondary party colours are used. An example is the Progressive Party - their primary colour is #FF0000, which is the same as the Labour Party's red so we use their secondary colour #9E9E9E  instead. A political party can change it's branding and colours used here should respect that - National recently changed from #0000CD to #00529F and so did our representation of their colour. Sometimes the criteria for choosing a party colour (where none exists) can seem arbitrary - the Liberal Party uses #FFDF00 on the grounds that yellow is historically used for Liberal parties overseas and when I needed a colour for Ratana I simply took a colour sample from the roof of the Ratana church image here on wikipedia #A52A2A as it is a red/brown colour recognisable as those used in Māori culture.

For the full list of NZ political party meta attributes see Index of New Zealand political party meta attributes. I'd also suggest that this discussion should move to Wikipedia talk:Index of New Zealand political party meta attributes as it is all about the meta attributes and has absolutely nothing to do with the actual election. Fanx (talk) 21:20, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Another non-NZ perspective - in the list of results the background colours are a pastel version of the party colours, except for ACT. It's really jarring compared to the others. Any reason? (Perhaps the other colours are TOO pastel, I can barely see the difference) Bazj (talk) 10:02, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Results
Infobox and result templates updated with 100% counted provisional results. [ Yawn ] Too tired to change the text, but need to update: -Kelvinc (talk) 11:48, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Clark stepping down as LAB leader.
 * 2) Key says in speech ACT and UF ready to work with NAT to form government (sufficient grounds to show Key as next PM in infobox).
 * 3) NZF out of parliament.


 * I added those items to the introduction. Teemu Leisti (talk) 10:37, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Māori Party
The Maori party did not win all of the maori seats, labour won two! This needs to be reexamined and changed! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.65.35.18 (talk) 22:47, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
 * What it said was that all the seats won by the Māori Party were Māori seats, but I appreciate that it wasn't clear and your edit is an improvement.- gadfium 01:18, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Also9 south island elecotrate stuff all wrong, population in Aorkai actually increased and selwyn not part of old Aoraki seat

Picture quality
The picture of ACT leader Rodney hide is rather low quality (looks like it's taken from a camera phone in a pub!). I suggest changing it to the one used on his personal profile... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rodney_Hide_at_parliament.JPG ... which is of a much higher picture quality. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rgiltrap (talk • contribs) 10:26, 19 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree and have replaced the picture. We didn't have the better picture available to us at the time this article was started.- gadfium 20:53, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Peer review
Results here

2008 Election Results Table
The other should be 6.54% to make it add to 100%. The correct figure is (153,461 / 2,344,566 = 6.545). Rounded to 6.55 for 2dp but rounded to 6.54 to add to 100.00. I'm not sure how to easily fix this table to amend this error.202.139.104.226 (talk) 01:21, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

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External links modified
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I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on New Zealand general election, 2008. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20120212235514/http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/events/election2008/stories/2008/10/10/1243797a5db4 to http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/events/election2008/stories/2008/10/10/1243797a5db4

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Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 06:21, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on New Zealand general election, 2008. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20061002113839/http://www.elections.org.nz/voting/ec-post-election-deadlines.html to http://www.elections.org.nz/voting/ec-post-election-deadlines.html
 * Added tag to http://www.elections.org.nz/news/enrolment-records-set-2008.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081205015253/http://www.elections.org.nz/study/researchers/electoral-compendium-2005.html to http://www.elections.org.nz/study/researchers/electoral-compendium-2005.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 11:57, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

External links modified (February 2018)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 6 external links on New Zealand general election, 2008. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081014141711/http://www1.elections.org.nz/record/registers/registered-political-parties.html to http://www.elections.org.nz/record/registers/registered-political-parties.html
 * Added archive https://archive.is/20120630051204/http://www.elections.org.nz/news/2008-election-official-results.html to http://www.elections.org.nz/news/2008-election-official-results.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081017191904/http://www1.elections.org.nz/record/resultsdata/elections-dates-turnout.html to http://www.elections.org.nz/record/resultsdata/elections-dates-turnout.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120212235417/http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2008/10/14/124379b61011 to http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2008/10/14/124379b61011
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081007034559/http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/576182/2178708 to http://www.tvnz.co.nz/view/page/576182/2178708
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090725071247/http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/newsdetail1.asp?storyID=145006 to http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/newsdetail1.asp?storyID=145006
 * Added tag to http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/4606304a6016.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 18:06, 17 February 2018 (UTC)