Despite being the incumbent, he initially polled behind his major challenger until the large 2010 Canterbury earthquake on 4 September 2010. His high-profile handling of the civil emergency was widely praised, and polls taken later showed him taking the lead. It was announced on 9 October that Parker had been re-elected for a second term with 68,245 of the votes to Jim Anderton's 51,566 based on 98% of the votes counted.