Penny Simmonds will go back to Wellington for a third term representing Invercargill after finishing 9615 votes clear of Labour's Janice Lee on election night, even as her party lost a large slice of its support in the city.

With every voting place reported, the preliminary count published by RNZ from Electoral Commission data gives the National MP 19,727 votes, or 59.4 per cent of those cast for a candidate. Ms Lee, the Koha Kai trust founder standing for Labour for the first time in the seat, received 10,112 (30.5 per cent). Dave Kennedy of the Greens polled 2066, Anntwinette Grumball of the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party 824 and independent Hayden Seager 475. In all, 33,204 candidate votes have been counted.

The margin is a shade under the 9874 majority Mrs Simmonds had over Labour's Liz Craig in 2023, although special votes are still to be added. Her share of the candidate vote has gone up, from the 55 per cent recorded three years ago. Her first win, in 2020, came by just 224 votes.

The Otago Daily Times reported that she reached her election-night gathering at Invercargill's Ascot Park Hotel at roughly 7.45pm on Saturday, confident but unwilling to celebrate early, and that the result was beyond doubt once about two thirds of the count was in.

She told the paper the result felt "pretty satisfying" on a personal level, and she thanked the volunteers who had delivered flyers and knocked on doors.

She was less relaxed about the national picture, which she described during the evening as a "nail biter". Many votes, including those from overseas, had still to be counted, she said, and what her third term looked like would turn on whether National was in government. Until that was known she was, in her words, "sort of on edge still".

The party vote in the electorate explains the caution. National remained the most popular party in Invercargill with 11,280 votes (33.7 per cent), but the ODT calculated that was 4747 fewer than in 2023, when The Southland Tribune put National's share in the seat at 42 per cent. Labour took 9090 party votes (27.1 per cent), up from about 25 per cent.

Much of what National shed appears to have stayed on the right. ACT collected 4488 party votes (13.4 per cent) and New Zealand First 4440 (13.2 per cent), the latter up from 2778 three years ago. The Greens received 2504 (7.5 per cent) and Opportunity 1295 (3.9 per cent), about three times its 2023 tally according to the ODT, which also noted that turnout was lower everywhere.

The gap between Mrs Simmonds' personal vote and her party's, more than 8400 votes, mirrors the vote-splitting seen around the country. National leads in 42 electorates but attracted only 29.2 per cent of party votes nationally, so it has no list MPs at all on the preliminary figures.

That has cost the party several of its most senior ministers, and the Tribune's Logan Savory wrote on election night that attention would now turn to what part Mrs Simmonds might play around the Cabinet table if National leads the next government.

No comment from Ms Lee was included in the election-night reports the Herald was able to read. She was ranked 61st on Labour's list, the Tribune reported before the election, which is too low to bring her into Parliament.

The count is not final. The Electoral Commission will add special votes, including those cast overseas and outside the electorate, before declaring the official result on Friday 27 November.