Looking back on 2014 New Zealand's historians will see an unremarkable election. The economy was booming, the Government stable, the Prime Minister popular and opinion polls giving his party every prospect of a comfortable re-election. In September, National and its partners were duly returned with the same majority as in the previous Parliament. But within that majority lies a result that is remarkable indeed.
National won 60 seats, one more than at the election in 2011, which had been one more than when the party came to power in 2008. Only twice previously have parties increased their vote in office, National in 1951 and Labour in 1987. This National-led Government equalled the feat in 2011 and exceeded it this time, retaining 47 per cent of the vote and adding a seat.
Even if historians note that achievement and attribute it in large part to the popularity of John Key, they probably will not realise how much he overcame in 2014. The most fierce opposition came not from parties in Parliament but two antagonists not even standing for election. One, Kim Dotcom, financed a party he hoped would put an opposition coalition into power. The other, Nicky Hager, wrote a book he hoped would stain the Prime Minister's reputation. Both were to be disappointed.
Mr Dotcom's miscalculations were spectacular. He held rallies at which an obscenity was hurled at Mr Key. He proudly told his launch how he had hacked the account of a Prime Minister in his native Germany while the party's press secretary swore at reporters who wanted to interview him. He promised a "moment of truth" that turned out to be a disclosure of an internet cable tap that had not happened. He produced celebrity whistleblowers Edward Snowden and Julian Assange on screen from exile but voters resented their attempt to influence the election.
Hager was more successful. Commentators and academics agreed with him that it was improper for the Prime Minister's Office to collude with an aggressive blogger against the Government's critics. Hager's source, a hacker who had obtained years of blogger Cameron Slater's private email, set up his own daily news feed and National's campaign had nothing it could produce that might change the subject. Out on the road, Mr Key had no idea what might hit him from one day to the next.
