Labour had its nose bloodied in key seats in Saturday's election that just a few years ago it would have considered safe as houses.
Despite running a strong campaign in the closing weeks its share of the party vote slipped from 34 per cent to 27 per cent.
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But while the party vote took a hammering, there were some victories in the electorates; Damien O'Connor won back West Coast-Tasman from National and Rino Tirikatene the southern Maori seat of Te Tai Tonga from the Maori Party.
Chris Hipkins in Rimutaka increased his majority from 753 to 3126 but that was about all the good news there was for Labour.
In a remarkable result, Brendon Burns and Nicky Wagner were tied on 10,493 votes each but that only shows how far Labour has slipped in a seat that had held since 1946 and won in 2005 with a margin of nearly 8000.
Labour-National tie in Christchurch Central
Special votes will decide if Mr Burns can hold onto the seat by the skin of his teeth.
Immediately to the north, in Waimakariri, Kate Wilkinson defeated the incumbent Clayton Cosgrove, whose majority had been slowly slipping since 2002, when he held a majority of 10,000.
Labour could not retake Auckland Central, with Jacinda Ardern coming within 535 votes of National's Nikki Kaye and Carmel Sepuloni ran Paula Bennett close in Waitakere, but was 349 shy at the end of the count.
Former Labour Party president Andrew Little did not make much of an impression on National's Jonathan Young, who increased his majority from 105 to 4130 in the former Labour stronghold of New Plymouth.
Charles Chauvel was meant to run United Future leader Peter Dunne close in the Wellington seat of Ohariu, but Dunne actually increased his winning margin, eventually winning by 1646 votes.
Despite the losses, party leader Phil Goff is not stepping down immediately but will advise his caucus on Tuesday of his intentions.
Labour was "a bit bloodied but not defeated" and vowed the party would be back in 2014 to beat National, he said.
NZN