Today the Chief Electoral Officer announced some changes to the election results. In the two weeks since the election, all votes have been counted again to check that the original count was accurate. Also the Special votes were counted. Special votes were made by people who were not in their own electorate at the time of voting. Some were on holiday or on business in another part of New Zealand or overseas.
National lost one seat so now has 60 MPs. There are 121 seats in Parliament this time so National needs the support of ACT and UnitedFuture. Prime Minister John Key has already got their support.
The percentage of votes for Labour has increased from 24.69 to 25.13, just enough for Andrew Little to keep his seat. He was number 11 on the list.
The Greens also increased the number of votes for their party. They have 10,000 more votes than last time. Their percentage increased from 10.2 to 10.7 which has given them an extra MP. They now have 14 MPs.
The next business for the Labour MPs, is to vote for a leader. This person will be the leader of the Opposition.
Vocabulary
• Chief Electoral Officer – a government employee responsible for elections
• original – first one
• accurate – correct