In fact, it is short odds-on most people did not even know that Dr Parmar had been a two-term National list MP from 2014-20, even though at the time the party having secured a former Families Commissioner as a candidate had been regarded as something of a coup.
On Wednesday Act New Zealand proudly trumpeted that Dr Parmar would be its candidate in the Pakuranga electorate, and that it was likely that its board would rank her in an electable position on its party lift.
Unfortunately, in its haste to crow it misspelled her name in its press release, but Act’s triumphalism remained unabashed.
The Parliamentary prospects of a list MP in a support party might seem a minor concern, but Dr Parmar’s defection raises serious questions about the party management of National and also about its relations with Act, with which it will need to work if National leader Christopher Luxon is to assume the treasury benches after the October election.
"Diversity" is a much touted necessity for any party aspiring to power and rightly so too ... the cloak of people from which New Zealand is woven comprises many and varied strands and our leaders should look as assorted as the people they are elected to represent.
National in particular has been challenged for having a caucus which does not reflect the modern make-up of the country, a situation which is partly explained by its list MPs largely being swept away in the 2020 landslide.
Act New Zealand is the smaller party now but it has lofty goals and seemingly no intention of appreciatively accepting 10% or so of the party vote and gratefully taking its sweetheart deal in leader David Seymour’s seat of Epsom.
Act is satisfied Mr Seymour’s seat is now safe — and so it should be, given National finished third there last election and Mr Seymour’s popularity and incumbency propelled him to a 9244 majority.
Act is also seemingly in no danger of dipping below the 5% threshold, polling consistently in the 8%-12% range.
Full of confidence, Act looks willing and increasingly able to take National on.
The bigger party will attempt to shrug this off as a minor irritant, but if someone so committed to the blue cause as to have stood for Parliament for National several times now finds the yellow corner more appealing, it should have alarm bells ringing somewhere.
National suffered a defeat of historic proportions three years ago, but recent polling suggests there may be a way back to power for it in 2023.
But it will have no hope of victory unless it recovers a substantial proportion of those voters who abandoned it three years ago.
Some of those voters will have ticked Act instead. Act has clearly demonstrated that it has no intention of meekly giving them back, and Dr Parmar switching sides adds weight to the argument that National is yet to convince all its former faithful that they should return to the fold.
Some of those voters may have changed the habit of a lifetime and voted Labour. They are possibly among the still large number of undecided voters not telling the pollsters what their intentions are, and the fact they are still pondering should also give National cause to reflect.
Then there is the great unknown of our politics, New Zealand First.
It takes votes off everyone, and if Winston Peters looks in any way like hauling his party back across the 5% threshold it too could be a brake on National’s ambitions.
Not that Labour can indulge in any schadenfreude at this news. Depending on which poll you read, there is every chance it could squander its ground-breaking MMP single-party majority, particularly if any sense of complacency sets in and stops it from fighting what looks like being a very close election without the required vigour and determination.
Dr Parmar is a pawn in a wider political game, but as any chess player will tell you pushing a pawn forward at the right time can make all the difference come the end game.
