Green Party leader Russel Norman . Photo / Sarah Ivey
The political landscape has been redrawn and we can now see what it will look like for the next three years.
National has tied in its support partners - Act's John Banks, United Future's Peter Dunne and the three surviving members of the Maori Party - which it needed as a buffer against a paper-thin majority in the House.
Labour has chosen a new leader, the untested one-termer David Shearer, but at least he's the member for Mt Albert and that has to mean something, surely.
John Key, too, was a relatively untested newbie when he became the National leader and it didn't seem to do him any harm.
If Shearer can indeed forge a new Labour Party out of the rubble of the old, then perhaps we can again look forward to having an opposition which is worth the electorate's serious consideration. In our democracy that is absolutely essential.
The Greens with 14 seats and New Zealand First with eight have been rather quiet since the election, but have no doubt been organising themselves before they take their seats in Parliament next week.
For all the bollocking I have given Winston Peters in recent years, I am, considering the makeup of the new Parliament, tremendously glad that he and his colleagues are there. Why? Because they could well have to act as a counterfoil for the Greens.
The Greens are dangerous. They are more than a polite group of tree-huggers, slug-savers and water samplers but you rarely, if ever, hear of the more sinister planks of their policy, which are frightening to say the least to those of us who care about what really matters.
As a pro-life mate of mine reminded me this week, in 2008 the Greens in the Victorian Parliament voted for the decriminalisation of abortion. This meant that it was no longer a crime to kill an unborn child and Victoria now has the most permissive abortion law in the world. It provides that any woman can demand an abortion for any reason.
The Greens in Australia also support same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption, and an education system which teaches that homosexuality is normal.
Last year the Greens promoted bills to legalise euthanasia in the New South Wales, Western Australian and Victorian Parliaments. Senator Bob Brown, the leader of the Greens in the Australian federal Parliament, has said that passing euthanasia laws is a top priority.
My mate reckons that the New Zealand electorate ought to recognise that in our Parliament the Greens represent a threat to the protection of the right to life of unborn children, the elderly and the ill and to the institution of marriage as exclusively between one woman and one man.
He points out that the Green Party in Germany has similar policies.
"The Greens," he wrote, "are a serious threat to the sanctity of life ethic and the right to life of every person from conception to natural death. They are also a threat to the sanctity of marriage.
"We should recognise that the long-term objective of the Greens is to reduce the world's population, creating a world in which nature is the dominant 'right' with humanity subservient to that 'deity'."
Another mate of mine suggests that same-sex adoption is likely to be pushed by the Greens and Labour this term, but opposed by NZ First. The big question is whether National will resist this social engineering. The same applies to same-sex marriage.
As for the decriminalisation of abortion, Labour MP Steve Chadwick, who was championing this law change, lost her list seat at the election but we can expect that "cause" to be picked up by another Labour, or Green, MP.
And Peter Dunne is the only parliamentarian known to oppose euthanasia.
If Peters and his offsiders do nothing else in the next three years than stand against any move by the Greens and/or Labour to advance their murderously liberal humanism, they will have the gratitude and the support of hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders who see the sanctity of life as the bedrock on which civilised society is built.
Among other matters which will be carefully watched is what the Government will do about the drinking age and the intolerable harm done by excessive alcohol consumption.
This will be back on the parliamentary agenda early next year but unfortunately last term's National-led government showed little will to deal with the obvious harms of alcohol abuse.
It has ignored many of the solutions put forward by the Law Commission after consulting extensively with the public, and far too many senior politicians are promoting a split drinking age that will send a mixed message and fail to acknowledge the harm alcohol does to the developing brains of teenagers.
Improvements to the economy, health, education, infrastructure and communication are all very well. But it is decisions on these humanitarian issues which will ultimately dictate the shape of our future society.
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