Labour's dominance over National was such that for many people, the question was not whether Labour would win, but whether Labour would receive the absolute majority it sought.Įleven MPs, including two Alliance MPs, six National MPs, and two Labour MPs intended to retire at the end of the 46th Parliament. Many opinion polls for the election indicated that Labour was popular enough to conceivably win an absolute majority, leaving it able to govern without the support of smaller parties. Opposing Labour were the National Party (centre-right), United Future (centrist), New Zealand First ( populist), ACT New Zealand ( free-market). It also relied on support from the Greens, but this was a largely informal arrangement, and the Greens were not a part of the administration itself. It governed in coalition with the smaller (and more left-wing) Alliance, which had 10 seats. Some commentators believe that a mixture of these factors was responsible.īefore the election, the Labour Party held 49 seats in parliament. Critics, however, claimed that Clark could have continued to govern, and that the early election was called to take advantage of Labour's strong position in the polls. The Prime Minister, Helen Clark, claimed that an early poll was necessary due to the collapse of her junior coalition partner, the Alliance. This was several months earlier than was required, a fact which caused considerable comment. On 12 June the government announced that the country would have a general election on 27 July. Helen Clark called the Greens 'goths and anarcho-feminists' during the campaign. The book examined how the government handled the contamination of a shipment of imported corn with genetically modified seeds.

The release of Nicky Hager's book Seeds of Distrust prior to the election also sparked much debate. Some commentators have claimed that the tension between Labour and the Greens on this issue was a more notable part of the campaign than any tension between Labour and its traditional right-wing opponents.

It saw the reelection of Helen Clark's Labour Party government, as well as the worst-ever performance by the opposition National Party (the 2020 election would see it suffer a greater defeat in terms of net loss of seats).Ī controversial issue in the election campaign was the end of a moratorium on genetic engineering, strongly opposed by the Green Party. The 2002 New Zealand general election was held on 27 July 2002 to determine the composition of the 47th New Zealand Parliament.

Scudo accartocciato