Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has had her best result, while National Leader Simon Bridges has had his worst, in the preferred prime minister stakes of the 1 NEWS Colmar Brunton Poll.
Support for Ardern leapt 7%-points to 51%, while support for Bridges fell 1%-point to 5% – putting him on par with National MP Judith Collins.
The poll was conducted between April 6 and 10, after the Christchurch terror attack and Ardern's visit to China was announced.
Support for former Prime Minister John Key hit 59% in September 2011, after the Canterbury earthquakes.
The Government’s response to the terror attacks appeared to overshadow concerns over the possible introduction of a capital gains tax, with support for Labour climbing 3%-points to 48% and National dropping 2%-points to 40%.
The Green Party was steady at 6%, New Zealand First up 1%-point to 4%, and Act steady at 1%.
Securing 60 seats, Labour would only be one seat shy of being able to govern on its own.
The survey saw 1009 eligible voters polled via landline and mobile phone. The maximum sampling error is ±3.1%-points at the 95% confidence level.
45 Comments
The current zeitgeist is that one may not criticise the glorious leader as that is racist or wrongthink or islamophobic or something and only hagiography is acceptable with regard to the PM unless you are a Nazi. But that will pass, and as well as she has been fronting for the cameras in the last month (and she has) it has not been a period that required her to do anything more than posture for the media. She remains intellectually insufficient for the role she is in and has a cabinet full of screwups and incompetents making the job even harder. When the economy starts to drag further the electorate will turn on her, hard.
I tend to agree, increasingly.
I like Ardern, but I still think she is naive in some respects, especially economically.
And yes those below her range from mediocre at best to hopelessly out of their depth!
I don't rate Bridges, but I rate his senior team higher than Labour's.
Foyle i disagree with your comment about being unable to criticise the PM. The problem is too many of those who criticise her do so simply from the perspective she is Labour, not National, or a woman and mother, not a man. That criticism is pointless, and harmful.
Additionally i disagree with your commentary on her intellectual capacity. If you have an issue with her policies state them, in detail so that they can be discussed on their merits. Your criticism of her is essentially unfounded, as you provide no base for it other than a very broad and essentially meaningless statement. Don't be a coward - put your money where your mouth is, or are you just a troll?
I am not politically aligned in any way. I think JA is doing a fantastic job in establishing NZ in the world, far better than JK or HC could have done. As for policies, i suggest that you are too wedded to the now proven to be flawed 'free market' model that they are looking at trying to unwind. i don't agree with the way they are doing some things, but they must, and are trying to walk a very fine line to prevent economic collapse while unwinding a model that has not worked for NZ, and had been highly damaging. It will likely take generations and the progress will be glacial sometimes, but it must happen.
Ardern's intellectual capacity: https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2018/09/pm_doesnt_know_what_gdp_is.html
A scary lack of comprehension after 10 years in parliament. She rarely shows up for question time, sets a record for most absent PM since returning from maternity leave. When she does bother to attend she relies heavily on answers being fed to her by people around her, and Mallard finding excuses to save her floundering. This has been frequently raised as an issue by the opposition. https://twitter.com/hamishpricenz/status/1070443358437302274?lang=en
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12172869
She was lazy in opposition, 9 years of doing F.A., her comically weak private members bills are testament to that. And the problem she faces is that being PM is a 100+ hour a week job, with vast reading to keep on top of, and high level management skills and judgement that she doesn't possess. She is an incredibly well paid autocue reader, without the skillset needed for the rest of the job.
This is more like it Foyle. I agree absenteeism would be an issue. However i believe every PM (and most ministers) would have a team around them to provide advice and do most of the reading required. i doubt whether there would be very many people who could literally work (including read) for 100+ hours a week and survive for very long, men or women. I am prepared to cut her a little slack because she is a new, first time mother and finding balance in those circumstances is challenging for anyone, let alone the PM. But despite that i still think she is doing a creditable job as our head of state (don't mention the Queen, JA is our actual HoS). Besides the PM is often just a figure head, there to lead a team, and it is the ministers who are expected to provide the depth of detail on their portfolio subjects. How good is she at keeping and leading a united coalition team?
Retired-Poppy. Best not get too excited, maybe have a sit down, cuppa and wine biscuit; at this same mid point in the last electoral cycle the nats were at 54% and the labs at 33%. This is Ardern's 'year of delivery' which could be read as meaning she'll be forced to make some hard decisions and take some actual risks (as opposed to taking populist easy shots such as her Folau lecture ).
She has not silenced this critic. It is easy for overseas people do fawn over her but we actually live with her incompetence in all other areas. The PM is a one trick pony - nodding sympathetically. To be honest I think any leader would have done a good job post Christchurch terrorist attack as it requires just to be a human. Who wouldn't be moved by the intense suffering of others?
NoFax. Like you I believe Ardern's CHCH response was dignified and prime ministerial and that our recent PMs would also have been similarly appropriate. But the adulatory response of media has been unseemly, often placing Ardern at the centre of the story rather than as just one of the actors. It seems almost the entire fourth estate has been caught up in the eulogising, including an article on this site yesterday gushingly describing her performance as 'extraordinarily adroit'. It was neither. Appropriate, proper, empathetic, providing needed leadership on coming to terms in our thinking on the atrocity, yes, but materially different to the standard we expect and that other civic leaders around the world have delivered when addressing recent similar events ? - no. For me the journalistic nadir was a worshipful piece investing the much reproduced photo of her hijab wearing image with religious imagery.
Anyone could have put on a headscarf and posed for photos (ok, except for Bridges, which actually highlights that JA has an unfair sexist advantage). The sycophantic left wing press who are lauding this as being important are doing so because its good clickbait and gets likes on social media. Nobody can be bothered discussing her appalling economic and policy failures, no likes in that. Apparently all you need to be PM these days is to take a good photo. Just like the UN photos - who can recall what she actually said when she was there? Nobody? But I bet you all remember the photo of her baby in the UN eh?
Much of the MSM see their great hope for better pay lies (heh) with working for left wing ministerial staffs. Their whole social circle is deeply in bed (sometimes literally) with Green and Labour MPs, live left, vote left, promote left. TV is also very youth-focused due to advertisers chasing their easily influenced discretionary spend, and youth tend left. Media in general likely also see the only hope for their survival in greater subsidisation from big-govt propagandising left (all that dodgy business last year surrounding Curren and Hirschfield's secret meetings that eventually saw Curren demoted). The bias has become pretty extreme, so bad that most right wing people I know have switched off NZ media entirely - we're not large enough to sustain right-aligned media (other than in radio) as UK, USA and Australia are. In the one field where there is left/right competition left aligned fully subsidised RNZ is gradually losing share to more right-aligned competitors. Interest.co.nz seems to be just about the last politically neutral site in the country. Long may it thrive.
Yes you have me right with that one. Propganda is of course total control of the narrative, what is excluded, or forgotten, as much as the rhetoric. The level of co-ordination on this one is what has me impressed (in a negative sense). What is compelling about this is the sense I have of living in history, how everyone has no damn clue it has been done to them. That includes some of the actors that are totally unaware of the part they played.
Fritz. Wishful thinking. Even with the highly effective coalition spin machine running at full speed, the fact that Labour clearly wanted to filch part of the family bach and a chunk of middle NZ's inheritances, will dog them. Ardern will no doubt deliver her usual 'we've absolutely positively listened to the electorate' line but her party's socialist designs on the savings of kiwis is now firmly established in the electorates mind.
If I were a NAT supporter, I would be looking for some bold responses. I would be looking for Bridges to walk the talk. Will they reverse ALL of Labours CGT proposals, free tertiary study, $50 increase in student allowance, ring fencing and healthier homes? Nope. Will they once again starve the DHB's of much needed cash? - YES
That is National's problem in a nutshell. How to reverse stupid decisions made by previous administrations without causing outrage. Viewed in isolation each spending item looks essential once it is in place, as the alternatives have been destroyed. So they failed to sort housing out last time around and fell back on selling residency to keep the place afloat and keep people in work. Change, any change, seems to cause outrage, apart from more government spending, which people seem to believe some one else will pay for, quite who isn't clear.
Retired- P. Sure - with the comrades at 51% it'd be a perfect time to show your hand. Not. And as it seems to have escaped your notice, health minister Clark is currently playing hard ball on DHBs requests for proper funding. Or is it only when Nat ministers do this that it is naughty ?
Agree i've almost been converted to Ardern expect the party's stance on CGT. Im sure labour could guarantee themself another term if they held a referendum for CGT. Id vote labour if it wasn't there view on CGT. Hold a Referendum for GCT, let that be a separate issue to vote on.
No to a referendum. Most do not understand tax, so would go with it a CGT. This will not achieve anything much apart from compliance costs and inefficiency. We need to change the systems to be fairer, but CGT is not the way.
Would a CGT discourage the holding of large amounts of land just outside every NZ city boundary, waiting for a small lot to be released at crazy prices as the boundary changes? Nope.
Land prices are the key. The rest is noise.
rastus. Would have agreed with you about lack of public understanding on CGT until the recent poll which I think suggested a reasonable grasp of the issues and more sophisticated rationalisations than I'd have expected. I was pleasantly surprised and not sure I agree there would be clear cut voter support for a CGT.
This temporary firming up in the pool result is based on others unfortunate and luck.
1. Unfortunate opponent -- the damage Jami-lee Ross made to Mr Bridges was irreparable, and take long time to heal for National
2. Terrorist attach in ChCh -- a perfect performance opportunity J Arden really excels at
3. China visit -- it should have been sooner but the timing was perfect
The question is that how long the pool result will hold given the economic bumpy road ahead. National should really choose another leader.
Not at all surprised about the polling result. Ardern's compassion, smile and eloquency are her core strengths, that's what got her elected. I am nevertheless concerned these qualities conceal major shortcomings in business which will in time affect all new zealanders including her core supporters, the working, ever increasing tax paying, Kiwi.
Arden did a good job with Christchurch, but I am still not going to vote for her. But National need to get some boldness in their approach, they seem to replicate what they did in Government, tried to look 'goodish but scared to offend' They never got real definite on the real issues. eg housing and immigration. Currently they support an inquiry into Pharmac (for crying out loud)
As for Bridges, he never impressed me until the issue over the Czech criminal. He has potential yet.
yes I never understood how that ceased to be centre stage, it still stinks. Soubrek's prison friend and character witness Alex Swney is the brother of a man married to Jacinda’s cousin and Hardcore's thankyou text to Jacinda: “…….made a bunch of really bad choices but he’s a good guy deep down, so thank you to Ian and yourself for giving him another chance…..” implies that she was somehow aware (at minimum). There are evidently multiple mutual acquaintances between Soubrek and Ardern so I do wonder if this will pop up again at a later less convenient moment. It's often the coverup rather than the crime that brings down politicians.
Foyle. To slightly misquote David Gergen .... 'We've seen the Hubris. And will inevitably see the scandals.'
The Soubrek taint hangs over Lees-galloway, Shane 'the fixer' Jones regularly dances at the edge of the cliff, Twyford somehow hangs on despite chronic failure and Peters gives Ardern's instructions to engage with Erdogan the middle finger with no reaction from the anointed one. The coalition totters from one risky scenario to the next but survives, partly due to a lack of effective media interrogation but mostly kept afloat by the Jacindamania life raft which will inevitably become increasingly waterlogged as the failures and scandals continue.
Seems potentially far more serious for Ardern than Lees Galloway in that she denied any influencing, yet engaged with multiple soubrek cheerleaders that Lees Galloway likely did not know. There is as yet no more evidence of any more undue influencing, but if it did occur then there are a whole lot of people who will know about it and one of them might eventually have motive to talk - half of them appear to be criminals with variable fortunes.
Labour came to power having a recipe (so we were told on the campaign trail)) to fix everything.
Immigration is rising at the last report
Selling of land to foreigners has risen
Few houses have been built so what has been accomplished and the answer is very little.
Ms Ardern is very lucky that she has a face that lends itself to looking sad(john kerryish) and concerned however CHCH will wear thin eventually but just when who would know.
Interesting how popularity surges for Key and Ardern after tragedy. No wonder politicians like to keep us in a constant state of fear of things such as climate change/plastic/Y2K... Mencken was right.
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
New Zealand had its greatest mass murder tragedy and still I read puerile anti PM comments
After she conducted herself better than any leader has recently in any country on the planet
In case you don’t know the UK the EU the USA Canada & Australia all have appalling leadership and are heading toward GFC2 to boot
Be thankful NZ has a strong empathetic leader because when the financial crash comes you are going to need her
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