National has already begun negotiations with its potential coalition parties, despite the final election results still being almost three weeks away.

Based on preliminary results National and ACT hold a slim majority at 61 seats - but they haven't ruled out needing the help of New Zealand First to get over the line if the special votes don't go their way, or if the overhang grows larger than just the one seat.

There are still 570,000 special votes to be counted with results not confirmed until November 3.

ACT Leader David Seymour spoke to Charlotte Cook.