Lee will get over defeat, says Key

Melissa Lee campaigned hard for the Mt Albert seat. Photo / Herald on Sunday

Prime Minister John Key conceded yesterday that the National Party could have given candidate Melissa Lee more support during the Mt Albert byelection.

But he does not believe that Labour's overwhelming win says a great deal about his Government of seven months.

Mr Key rejected a suggestion that Melissa Lee had been abandoned by the party hierarchy on Saturday night with no one from the leadership team nor party president Judy Kirk there.

Mr Key said he had had a long-standing personal commitment on Saturday night which had been in place months before the byelection - and he had telephoned Melissa Lee.

"It just would not have possible to attend irrelevant of whether we had won or not," Mr Key said.

Campaign manager and Cabinet minister Jonathan Coleman had been there.

Melissa Lee fought to compose herself on Saturday night, reading a brief statement in which she thanked supporters and said the result was no reflection on their hard work.

She said her mistakes had contributed to the result - talking of criminals from South Auckland using the motorway to bypass Mt Albert, saying she would come second, telling low-paid workers she earned $2 an hour- and that she would learn from the experience.

She later drove to Labour headquarters to congratulate David Shearer on his 9187-vote-majority win.

Asked if her career had been damaged, Mr Key said "not irretrievably. She will come back from this."

She had learned a lot and so had the National Party. "I think we should have realised earlier on that the enormous intensity in the byelection meant that we needed to put more support around [Melissa Lee] earlier. I think we have got to take some responsibility for that."

Mr Key did not believe that former National candidate Ravi Musuku would have done any better under the glare of the national media.

Labour leader Phil Goff said the result spelled the end of National's honeymoon and his party would redouble its efforts to make National a one-term Government.

Mr Key said that with a turnout of less than 50 per cent, the people of Mt Albert "seemed quite ambivalent about the byelection". He put National's low vote of 15 per cent down to supporters having decided the party could not win "and on that basis did not bother to show up".

"I don't think that what happens in a low-turnout byelection in Mt Albert translates to the national scene very well."

Mr Key said that before the campaign kicked off the first poll he saw had National 15 to 20 points behind Labour on the electorate vote."It was always the view of our pollsters that it would be virtually impossible to win it ... but you never say never."

Labour has cited polling that showed the two parties neck and neck at the outset in terms of party vote support.