After turning the deep blue Tāmaki seat pink this weekend, Brooke van Velden is looming as the Act Party’s next leader
It was her win in Tāmaki that gave Act its second electorate seat and confirmed that deputy leader Brooke van Velden is the party’s rising star.
Act had become increasingly confident that Brooke van Velden would take Tāmaki, but the size of her victory surprised most of the party faithful gathered at the Maritime room on Auckland’s Viaduct basin last night.
Van Velden romped home with at least a 4,500-vote margin over National’s Simon O’Connor. National Party supporters clearly decided to split their vote. While O’Connor was rejected National was a massive 13,000 ahead of Act in the party vote.
When Van Velden arrived at the Viaduct venue, about half an hour ahead of her leader, she was mobbed by cheering supporters. The 31-year-old arrived in Act’s big pink bus and was wearing a pink evening dress. On the campaign trail she was rarely seen without her pink overcoat.
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Her win was an important morale boost for Act and its supporters. The Party’s leader, David Seymour struggled through the last weeks of the campaign, at times appearing unsure of himself and seemingly unable to combat a resurgent Winston Peters. Act’s hopes of transitioning from a minor party to a major party floundered during the campaign after looking entirely possible earlier in year.
Seymour will not be challenged as leader in the short term – he remains highly regarded for his herculean effort in lifting Act from a 1 percent party with a single MP to 10 MPs at the 2020 election. The modest lift in its party vote last night will see Act add another MP to its team and bring in fresh talent like Todd Stephenson and Andrew Hoggard.
But Van Velden is looming as the party’s next leader. Her reputation as a hard worker was reinforced by her win in Tāmaki.
Van Velden herself told the crowd that she had spoken at 130 street meetings during her campaign in the electorate and later told reporters: “I will be what the voters of Tāmaki have asked for, an accountable hard-working MP. And I can’t wait to be in Tāmaki on Monday, listening to people and taking those conversations to Wellington.”
Act staffers say she is meticulous with her research, always reads the briefing papers and rarely, if ever, makes a mistake. She is the “head prefect” of the party’s parliamentary wing.
After the 2020 election Seymour told Newsroom that he saw Van Velden as a future leader and the person most likely to succeed him.
Last night, when asked by reporters what portfolio she wanted in the new National/Act government, a calm Van Velden replied: “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.”
The decision to target Tāmaki as a second seat for Act was a smart one by Seymour and his party. The electorate is not dissimilar to Seymour’s own, the nearby seat of Epsom. Party officials say Seymour picked up on the discontent with O’Connor early on and saw the potential for a hardworking, liberal candidate like Van Velden to make an impact. In his own speech to supporters, Seymour thanked “all the people who put their trust in us including my neighbours in Epsom and their neighbours in Tāmaki.”
Seymour wouldn’t be drawn on how Act will approach the negotiations with National or whether he would push for a referendum on the principles of Te Tiriti.
The firearms registry (which Act opposes) and youth justice (Act wants it to be placed under Corrections not Oranga Tamariki) are bound to be on the agenda.
Education is also likely to be a strong focus for Act. MP Simon Court told Newsroom that the party saw education reform as vital “or we won’t have much of a country in 20 years.”
Like National’s Christopher Luxon, David Seymour hasn’t been happy with Newshub’s coverage of its campaign and while the large screens at the venue featured both TVNZ and Newshub coverage of the night the sound was muted on Newshub.
About halfway through the evening it was felt TVNZ was lagging behind Newshub so the sound was switched on. A massive cheer went up when Newshub crossed to an interview with Seymour.
Within seconds the cheers turned to boos as Newshub cut away to Labour leader Chris Hipkins’ live concession speech. Within seconds Newshub was forgiven and the cheering restarted. Hipkins said what they had been waiting to hear: "Labour is not in a position to form a Government."
