Election Night 2017: What are these early numbers telling us?

With 5% of the count in based on advanced vote, the polls look roughly right.

This is a big enough sample to say that National is almost certainly going to finish first. They’ll be in a strong position to form a government, whether with NZ First, or even with their old team.

But not even a huge Labour advantage on the specials can take away this lead. But at the same time, the numbers would be enough for some kind of Lab-Green-NZ First combination. And Labour and the Greens will expect to collectively boost their result after special votes.

The advance vote has proved reliable enough in the last few elections. If we’re being rash and extrapolating from the early count, the National strategy has been thoroughly vindicated. We’ll need to wait and see how the electorates fall – and David Seymour could be in a scrap in Epsom. Tamati Coffey is leading Te Ururoa Flavell in Waiariki.