Live: On the campaign trail - four days to go

Craig Sinclair, a farmer from Tauwhare, makes his feelings clear during a rally held in Morrinsville today by farmers who feel they have been made a target during the election. Photo / Alan Gibson

With just four days till Saturday's election, National leader Bill English is campaigning in Marlborough, NZ First leader Winston Peters is on his big bus in Auckland and the Greens' James Shaw is in Wellington.

Labour leader Jacinda Ardern is with Leighton Smith on Newstalk ZB for an hour from 10am then heads to Wellington.

English is taking his campaign to the South Island while Labour's Jacinda Ardern will be in the capital, talking about health.

English is heading for Blenheim, where he'll visit several small businesses before making a lunchtime speech to the Marlborough Chamber of Commerce.

Ardern will be in Wellington's Newtown suburb, visiting a health centre to talk about the challenges facing the sector. She'll then move on to Victoria University where she'll talk to students about the importance of voting.

Labour needs to bring in as many young voters as it can - and they don't usually turn out as readily as older voters. Neither of the party leaders has a policy announcement on their agenda but they'll both be holding media standups while they're on the trail.

Advanced voting

The Electoral Commission advises that 445,350 people have advance voted so far compared with 225,513 by the same time at the 2014 election and 90,861 by the same time in the 2011 election.

MMP in a nutshell

You have two votes under MMP.

The Electorate Vote is for the person you would like to be your local Member of Parliament.

The Party Vote is the most important and is for the party you most want to be in Government.

The Party Vote determines how many MPs each party has.
Parties can only have MPs if they win at least 5 per cent of the Party Vote or if they win an electorate seat.

- Staff reporter, NZN