Election Time...

Oh? My Mum's 50th on that day....I will be way too busy to vote!!

Ewww, I HATE the run up to an election

Wish it had just been a snap election with no time for any of the campaigning bollocks that goes on!

Oh. Yeah.... didn't think of it like that

So are people going to be brave and share who they intend to vote for???

I'll show you mine....

I was originally thinking National....now I'm really not sure. Def not NZ First though.

Labour supporter here too.  Actually I tend to swing between Labour and the Greens but at this stage I'm voting Labour.

I'll be voting National and whoever their candidate is here, I can't remember who he is even though he came to our house    

National for me

Can I just ask.... and I'm not asking to cause yucky arguments, but those who are thinking of voting National, is it because you like John Key (cos we don't know too much around thier policies just yet), or is it because you are over Labour?

I had an interesting discussion with a friend around this the other night, and I just wondered what others were feeling round this.

minik8e wrote: I was originally thinking National....now I'm really not sure. Def not NZ First though.

I agree. I have never really been a huge Labour fan. I really think they have had their run. However, in saying that National really don't seem to have offered much of an alternative as far as policies go.

I think the next few months shall be interesting.

ohanlon82 - I am doing a research paper as part of my honours on political parties, and the National Party does not have a good track record in terms of spending in public services. Even though I critique Labour as well, I just don't support National one bit. Just remember many people on this forum rely on the Working For Families package and accommodation supplements. Labour had the guts to increase income threshold levels for such social security payments.

John Key is a charismatic politician, but he is also an inexperienced politician. He is controlled by a team of advisers. Well known fact in politicial circles.

Also remember that the leadership of the National Party is very unstable. They have gone through 4 leaders since 1996, and John Key is the 5th leader in that time. Labour has had the same leader in that period of time.

Sure Labour have had their mistakes, but studies have shown that people are more likely to criticise an organisation led by a female (a reason example is Theresa Gattung, who use to be the CEO of Telecom).

The reason why National are keeping policies to themselves at the moment, is because they know a lot of voters who have families are not going to like them. Scrapping things like ACC is a bad move, as it will make it harder for people to get treatment for work-related injuries. Even an accountantcy firm like PriceWarehouseCoopers (who are known to support conservative parties like National) said that privatising ACC is the worst thing to do, as the model in place is the most efficient in terms of levies charged, how claims are treated, and the financial structure. Insurance companies are only interested in profits, not the welfare of the person who has been injured.

So anyone who is going to vote National should rethink their decision, and start researching the policies of all political parties. I am not saying you should Labour, but make a researched decision when you go to the polling booth. The media distort the truth. Any media you do read or hear always has a politicial bias in it. For example, The Dominion Post is known to have a centre-right bias in its political articles.

Personally myself, I am giving my electorate vote to the Labour candidate and my party vote to the Greens.