KEY POINTS:
Two former Alliance leaders in the past week have claimed - incorrectly - that votes of parties that don't make it into Parliament are spread across all other parties.
In the case of the Progressives leader, Jim Anderton, he was making a pitch for New Zealand First voters to switch to his party.
In order to ram home his point he identified specific parties, saying that if New Zealand First was not returned to Parliament its votes would be "redistributed across all parties, including to National and Act".
Unite general secretary Matt McCarten used a similar argument in his newspaper column yesterday when trying to persuade supporters of the small left-wing parties outside Parliament to give their support - up to 2 per cent, he estimates - to the Greens.
The Electoral Act 1993 (clause 191, 4), however, makes it clear that if a party polls less than 5 per cent in the party vote across the country, and it does not win an electorate seat, its votes will be "disregarded". They will not be spread across all other parties.
The effect on the final result would be the same but Mr Anderton in particular cannot claim that New Zealand First votes would go to National and Act. Voters will have two votes this Saturday, an electorate vote for a local MP and a party vote for the preferred political party.
Generally speaking, the party vote is the more important and in most cases it determines how many seats a party has in Parliament overall - unless it wins more electorate seats than its party vote delivers.
If New Zealand First leader Winston Peters does not win back the Tauranga seat and the party wins 4 per cent of the party vote across the country, then none of its party votes will count and New Zealand First will not be returned to Parliament.
On the other hand, if the party wins 4 per cent of the party vote and Mr Peters wins Tauranga then New Zealand First would be entitled to 4 per cent of the seats in Parliament, even though it does not cross the 5 per cent threshold.
If 10 per cent of the total party votes cast in Saturday's election are for parties that fall short of the 5 per cent - and that fail to win an electorate seat - then only 90 per cent of the party votes cast across the country will count in determining the make-up of Parliament. But that would mean that a party with 45 per cent of the vote would have half of the seats in Parliament.
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... the combined vote of these left-wing parties [RAM, Workers Party, Alliance] will be less than 2 per cent. That will mean the party vote they get will be allocated proportionately to other parties that make it into Parliament.
Unionist Matt McCarten in his Herald on Sunday column.
He told a Grey Power meeting in Nelson today that if NZ First isn't returned to Parliament, its supporters' votes will be redistributed across all parties, including to National and Act.
Press release from Progressive leader Jim Anderton.
