It used to be that the first result would arrive at about quarter past seven from a returning booth in a country hall in Kawhia or somewhere and it would always suggest that about 80% of the country had voted National.
You'd really have no real idea until about 9 o'clock when the trickle turned to a torrent and you got to Mt. Eden and Hamilton East and the mood of New Zealand made itself known.
But now we have MMP. And although it’s taken about ten election nights for television to let go of the excitement of electorate races and just look at the percentages at quarter past seven, they have now.
