Samantha Gee of RNZ
ACT Party leader David Seymour has backed National's Blair Cameron for the Nelson electorate, while telling a public meeting the Upper South Island is facing "real problems" with the health system.
"There's been people turned away from healthcare that they desperately needed because the emergency departments resemble a war zone," Seymour said.
"Their wait lists are as long as a corridor and the corridor is where a lot of the treatment's being done."
He made the comments at a public meeting at the Rutherford Hotel in Nelson, where around 200 people turned up to hear from the ACT party leader.
He said Labour leader Chris Hipkins was "measurably the worst healthcare minister in New Zealand history" given the health budget increased and the number of ICU beds had fallen under his watch, and the health system was still digesting the restructure of district health boards into Health New Zealand, instead of tending to patients.
Seymour entered the room to whistles and applause and thanked those who came out "wearing our colours" with some wearing pink in support of the party.
"This is a meeting for everybody, for people from all walks of life, who are bound together by one thing - the future of our country."
He said the latest 1News poll showed the election was going to be "incredibly tight".
"There's a bit of scepticism out there, but it has the National Party up 4 percent to 32. New Zealand First down 2 points to 8. That's 40. And the ACT Party at 11, which, if you're following along, makes 51 percent and a majority of the vote.
"Every single vote will count, and we can win."
He said ACT planned to balance the books by the end of the decade with no new taxes and asked if anyone had read the party's fully costed fiscal plan.
One person raised their hand and Seymour said, "thank you so much for making my night".
He fielded questions about pay equity, employment issues, management of the conservation estate, research and development in farming, the Treaty Principles Bill and energy generation.
One woman said the race was going to be tight in Nelson and asked Seymour how to best support ACT, given its Nelson candidate Chris Baillie, didn't have a very good chance of getting in.
Listen to Caucus: Top political commentators unpick and make sense of New Zealand's election campaigns with frank and forthright discussion.
Baillie, a small business owner and former police officer, first entered parliament as an ACT list MP in 2020, but due to his lower party list ranking was not re-elected in 2023, when Labour MP Rachel Boyack narrowly beat National's Blair Cameron by 26 votes.
Seymour said if people liked ACT's policies, then they should party vote ACT.
"But your electorate vote, I would vote for the person who would answer my phone call at 5 o'clock on a Friday if I really had trouble and needed my local MP to help."
Seymour said he had spoken to Baillie before the meeting, who said he wasn't seeking the electorate vote in Nelson.
"I then asked Chris, well, this Blair person, is he a good person? And he said, yeah, he's a good guy. So based on the advice that I've had just in the last half an hour, I think you should give your candidate vote to Blair."
Seymour said he had worked with Boyack at Student Job Search around 25 years ago and that she too was a good person, "but if a person joins the Labour Party, then that can call into question all sorts of things about them".
One man told the audience he thought Seymour really raised the IQ of parliament, which was met with applause, while another said "that's because David Seymour, can see more".
"Thank you, sir, that's made my night," Seymour told him.
Before the event wrapped up, Seymour encouraged the attendees to get out there and share their views with their friends.
"You can influence people, say, 'I saw David Seymour, he's far less crazy than I realised, I think I'm going to give my party vote and you should too'."
He said everyone at the meeting could "get a couple more votes for ACT" if they chose to, while if they didn't like what they heard, that was ok, they just didn't need to tell anyone.
This story was first published on rnz.co.nz
