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All MMP elections are extremely close. Even those remembered as one-sided could easily have gone the other way.

In 2011, had just 10,000 National voters switched to Labour, the Māori Party would have had the balance of power between National-Act-United Future and Labour-NZ First-Green. John Key might have been a single-term footnote. Even in 2002, Bill English was just 2-3% away from being able to lead a National-NZ First-Act-United Future government, consigning Helen Clark to a single term. Sure enough, at the end of 2019, the polls had the next election too close to call, with perhaps a tiny advantage to National.

Entering 2020, Jacinda Ardern is certainly popular, but less so than Clark and Key when they first sought re-election. On its cornerstone issues of housing, health and child poverty, Ardern’s Government can point to no substantial progress. KiwiBuild became a joke. The Wellbeing Budget turned