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Former Federated Farmers president and Manawatu dairy farmer Andrew Hoggard says becoming a Member of Parliament overnight hasn’t sunk in yet.
“Maybe, once I’m seating in the parliamentary chamber, which I observed during a primary school trip, will make it reality,” he told Rural News.
Hoggard is part of the 11-strong ACT caucus elected last night. However, the final make-up of Parliament will be determined after the counting of special votes in the coming weeks.
ACT polled 9% of the party vote and for the first time, won two electorate seats.
Hoggard, ranked five on the ACT party list, also contested the Rangitikei, which was won by Suze Redmayne, National with 16300 votes; Hoggard polled 4990 votes.
Hoggard says he was pleased with the election result and the shift to the right.
“Everyone wanted change: I only wish we had got a few members of the team across the line,” he says.
“We’ve built on the previous 2020 outcome and will work on building further in 2026.”
For Hoggard, RMA reforms would be a priority this term.
“We got to have meaningful change. I knew about most of the problems but during the campaign I heard more and more stories about people getting caught up with regional councils while getting consents.”
Hoggard says the new Government must also cut “wasteful expenditure” to improve the economic situation.
On whether he was looking forward to a Cabinet appointment, Hoggard says a lot of votes are yet to be counted and the final make-up of Government was yet to be finalised.
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