By Chris Trotter*
What does the latest Roy Morgan poll tell us about the future of the Sixth Labour Government? Technically speaking, it tells us nothing. All it describes, statistically, is the balance of electoral forces in New Zealand at the time the poll was taken. If a general election was actually scheduled for tomorrow, then the numbers would be instructive. Since that event is, in reality, roughly eighteen months away, all Roy Morgan’s data is good for is providing fodder for political speculation.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
What is indisputable about the series of Roy Morgan polls undertaken since the 2020 General Election is that they record a steady decline in support for the Jacinda Ardern-led Labour Government. Labour’s current level of support, as measured by Roy Morgan, stands at 32 percent. That is not a comfortable number for either the Prime Minister, or her party. Indeed if the trend-line of which it now forms a part continues its relentless downward trajectory, then support for Labour will begin to haunt the very same territory that caused Ardern’s predecessor, Andrew Little, to step aside in favour of his deputy back in 2017.
It is important, at this point, to rehearse the extraordinary difference the elevation of Jacinda Ardern made to Labour’s fortunes. Just three years before the 2017 general election, Labour had recorded its worst election result since 1922. The hapless David Cunliffe had led Labour to a Party Vote of just 25.13 percent in 2014 – 11.76 percentage points below Ardern’s Party Vote of 36.89 percent. “Jacinda” restored Labour’s credentials as a viable rival for the Treasury Benches. Necessary, because people had begun to wonder.
But, Ardern’s unlooked-for elevation to the role of Prime Minister, courtesy of Winston Peters and NZ First, and her stunning success at raising the expectations of an electorate which had almost forgotten what optimism felt like, distracted political commentators from the brutal fact that since the first MMP election in 1996, Labour had never managed to attract more than 41.26 percent of the Party Vote. Indeed, if Labour’s Party Vote between 1996 and 2017 is averaged out, the result is a modest 34 percent. Too low to secure the reins of government – without a lot of help.
And right now Labour is two percentage points below even that inadequate number. Not so good. But, if the next round of opinion polls reveal a level of Labour support beginning with a “2”, what would happen then?
Between now and election day 2023, the answer is, almost certainly: nothing. Ardern, loyal Labour soldier that she is, will stay at her post and do everything within her power to turn the situation around. Such is the residual strength of her political magic – especially the spell woven out of the miraculous and unprecedented 50.01 percent “Covid Victory” she won for Labour in 2020 – that none of her colleagues will take the bet that the party’s endangered irons cannot, somehow, be pulled out of the fire.
If her magic does run out, however, a number of Ardern’s Cabinet colleagues will quietly begin to interrogate their reflections on the possibility of replacing the incumbent.
Critical to the depletion of Ardern’s political capital will be the steady deterioration of the New Zealand economy. This is practically unavoidable given the perfect offshore economic storm of Covid-generated inflationary pressures, ongoing supply-chain disruptions, and a shooting-war in Europe.
Not that the New Zealand public will generously accept that the cost-of-living crisis they are living through is a global creation. Those are simply not the thoughts that run through the minds of supermarket shoppers when they pick up a head of Broccoli priced at $4.00, that only weeks before had been selling for $2.00. Voters live behind their country’s borders, not beyond them. Lack of electoral charity begins at home.
That Ardern’s Deputy-Prime Minister, Grant Robertson, is also her Finance Minister, means that a 2023 Labour election defeat will not only be sheeted home to the incumbent Prime Minister, but also to the person in charge of the nation’s finances. In this regard, Robertson is damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. To bring the cost-of-living under control, the Finance Minister must allow the Reserve Bank to raise the price of money. High interest rates, however, can only lead to “the recession we have to have”. Not a prospect Covid-hit businesses and their employees are likely to welcome with open arms.
If the Sixth Labour Government goes down to defeat in 2023, then it must be assumed that any lingering thoughts about just one more Robertson run at the leadership will go down with it. Soufflés don’t rise a third time – not from the Dustbin of History.
Of this government’s leadership quartet of Ardern, Robertson, Chris Hipkins and Megan Woods: one, or both, of the duo left politically breathing in 2023 might be expected to have a crack at the top job.
At this point in the putative Game of Thrones, the smart money would have to be on “Chippy” Hipkins. Not only for his boyish likeability, but also for the fact that he is the last of the trio of “Clarkist” political advisers who have played such a crucial role in Labour’s fortunes between 2008 and the present. Certainly, he could anticipate the behind-the-scenes support of both Ardern and Robertson in any race for the leadership.
Because, of course, there will, almost certainly, be a race. If Labour’s caucus, defeated and depleted as it would be in the wake of a brutal election defeat, imposes a leader on the party rank-and-file it would set in motion precisely the same political machinery that spluttered into life following Caucus’s choice of David Shearer over the membership’s clear preference for David Cunliffe back in 2011. If the person imposed also just happened to be one of the leading lights of the “Anyone But Cunliffe” faction (i.e. Hipkins or Woods) matters would rapidly go from bad to worse.
And, for those who think that holding grudges for ten years is a little excessive, then just remember the bitterness of Louisa Wall’s valedictory. As a former Cunliffe supporter, she had no chance of a Cabinet seat. Purged from the ranks, she can join Charles Chauvel and Sue Moroney at the Chestnut Tree Café. Memories in the Labour Party tend to be long-lived – and dangerous.
The singular failure of the Sixth Labour Government to achieve any of its self-selected goals (apart from getting New Zealanders through the first few months of the Covid-19 pandemic) can only sharpen the perception, both in and out of Labour, that the New Zealand “Left” is in need of a damn good shake-up.
And if that takes the form of seeking out a leader with a track record of indisputably Labour policy initiatives – like Fair Pay Agreements – then the eyes of the party membership may end up turning to Michael Wood. Earnest and sincere, Wood may yet turn out to be the best fit for Labour’s electoral future. Personally, a social-conservative, but politically an economic radical, Wood could offer Labour members and voters an ideological package containing pretty much the opposite of the neo- and social-liberalism served up to them by the leadership that failed.
Pure speculation, of course, but Labour’s done stranger things.
*Chris Trotter has been writing and commenting professionally about New Zealand politics for more than 30 years. He writes a weekly column for interest.co.nz. His work may also be found at http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com.
88 Comments
Though the citizenry is often no peach itself; I've found the quality-of-legislation, divisiveness and rhetoric coming from Labour MPs (often leadership) to be outrageous - especially post their historic win.
Ideally Labour would sit in the corner until the next election and stop causing harm. Unfortunately there are too many in the commentariat dependent on Labour for their beard-n-butter and thus invested in their reelection - this is a corruption.
The Media's 55million Support Package.. what about the 90million in Covid Advertising? There is much, much more cash AND many, many more plum positions being dangled about.
As they proverbially say over at the BFD, "stick a fork in it, she's done". I don't know that Adern will step down, but the Labour wagons could start circling to roll her.
Chris Trotter's note to the BowalleyRoad version: The Chestnut Tree Café features in George Orwell’s dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four as the place where INGSOC party members who had fallen foul of Big Brother eked out the rest of their (usually dramatically shortened) lives.
There is now widespread buyers regret with Liebour.
Never in the history of politics has so much been promised to so many and delivered to so few.
About the only thing they seem to actually care about delivering is whatever brain farts their cousin bothering Maori caucus dreams up to advance their separatist agenda.
National of course are just as terrible in their own special way. The cycle of government failure is doomed to repeat.
B L,
Hard to disagree. I really hoped that this lot would do well and from abroad as I know from friends in various countries, Ardern's star still shines bright. But there have been just too many policy failures and I think what riles me the most is not incompetence, but the secrecy which they hide behind.
But I can't see me voting for Luxon, so perhaps for the first time, I may not vote at all.
No there isn't. A "green" vote is a vote for an even more extreme version of Labour. A vote for the Maori party is a racist wasted vote. ACT (and the Greens and National) also voted in favour of some of the things that Labour shoved through.
There is presently no good alternative for folk that don't like the wokery of the current Labour Party, and don't like the selfishness and extremism (but in the other direction) of the National Party, and don't go along with the individualism of the ACT party.
TOPs policy is to steal from those who worked all their lives to provide a home for their families and handout a UBI to those who can't be bothered getting out of bed.
TOPs leader should also explain how their deemed rate of return tax will work when prices are dropping 20%
Can you please explain how the current system is better than UBI?
Think of it this way:
At the moment if you go from unemployment benefit to working full time your effective increase is the difference between unemployment benefit and full time wage. Under UBI the effective increase is the full time wage. Thus encouraging people to work.
Also you have the added benefit of people who want to start their own business having some income coming in while they start up.
Oh and UBI is shown to improve mental health as you have income stability. Given our rates of depression and suicide its worth considering for that alone...
The current Natbour lot's policy is to transfer money from those who work for a living to provide food for their families - often now, not even a stable home - and hand it out as a universal benefit to wealthier older folk, coupled with landlord benefits handed to 60% of rentals...while running economic, tax and housing policy as a scheme that transfers wealth from those with wages and savings to those with assets.
Most younger Kiwis would be better off voting beyond the Natbour duopoly for parties that might actually reward productive hard work rather than just sitting on assets.
Have never come close to voting National until now. Will not vote Labour until last of their current ministers are a distant memory. Ask Louisa Wall how she was treated by the executive branch. We were all conned but I think (hope) their games over for many terms as of next election.
If Adern goes, so too does Labour. And they know it. The PMs identity & profile is the only glue holding the shambles together.It has never been recognised let alone quantified whether or not the electorate switched in allegiance and voted for Labour purely to shut out the Greens. But that potential will not apply next time. As well National in the last few elections have not had a viable single coalition partner on offer, but next time ACT will certainly provide that. So on those two factors alone the electorate will be viewing prospects in a very much different manner to 2020.
No idea what people saw in this Labour government then unbelievably they got in for a second term
It's political strategy as old as time: make everyone afraid, and then convince them that you're the one to save them from whatever it is they're afraid of.
It almost never fails, and saves you from having to rely on actual policy.
oof that hits home.
2 years ago National were a mess of bad people and bad comments on the Covid response - easy to be afraid of.
Next time when the economy is really in an awkward spot they won't have to work hard to get us afraid of Labour - we'd need to see a real black swan twist pretty soon to change this outcome.
Will they quit Labour?
Whats the other choice...oh yeah seven house Luxon.
Perhaps one of Peter Goodfellows more inspired picks...or perhaps another completely "out of touch" and arrogant choices.
The whole country knows what has happened to housing in NZ....the good and the ugly.
And what are they going to campaign on?....."lets reinflate the bubble"..."we've got this"
How much more welfare wealth transfers might flow to wealthy investors if the party of speculators gains power over our tax revenue again during hard times...? That could be a nightmare scenario for younger generations of Kiwis.
I struggle to believe they won't seek first to bail themselves and their mates out with taxpayer money.
We saw a good communicator who spoke what she genuinely believed.
We also saw the way that the Labour Party handled the earliest days of the Pandemic as it affected NZ.
Both were pretty good.
Things got worse after that, when they started to push a large amount of wokery onto ordinary NZers.
I would like a Govt that can actually do things. Not just front press conferences and talk about them. If one thing has been proven beyond doubt, and that is that Winston Peters was running the country during those first 3 years. Jacinda Ardern is clearly incapable of it. Which is not surprising, as Jacinda Ardern spent most of her time overseas leaving Winston in charge (which is ironic, considering that Winston was supposed to be the Foreign Affairs Minister). Now Jacinda is back on her overseas junkets, doing what she does best, appearing in front of the cameras. Who is running the country now?
IMO JA exposed herself too much with her appearances on the Daily Covid reports.People were able to see her in full flight and realise that what she was saying wasn't exactly what was happening on the ground.
The podium of truth became the podium of ifs,but and maybes.
She has been caught out like many with great campaign slogans as a poor choice of PM.
Having said that i believe with the support of others she may be PM for a 3rd term.
Yes "...the New Zealand “Left” is in need of a damn good shake-up" - as NZdrs also knew National well deserved a few years ago.
Labour are electoral history now the Empress has no co-governance clothes & no excuses (an absolute majority).
CT being of a certain vintage will remember that The Who sang it a long time ago: "We won't get fooled again"
I reluctantly voted for Labour last time as being the best of a poor bunch. Jacinda could retain power if she apologises for failure to deliver and explains why. For example KiwiBuild was impossible for reason xxxx; gangs are getting more powerful because xxxx; misbehaving state house tenants are not evicted because we forgot kindness applies to neighbours too; etc). The main excuse has to be "like other parties we listened to academics, NGOs, businessmen and foreigner interests but in future we will listen to and be most influenced by hard-working, low-paid struggling Kiwi families and their concerns"".
Jacinda won’t be staying. She is going to end up the least one of the least popular pollies in NZ history.
No one will think that her coming up with ideas on how labour could refocus their message is a good idea.
she has spent the last 4.5 years ensuring that they won’t be elected again for the foreseeable future.
Agree entirely Brock Landers - unfortunately the populace will continue to vote for short term handouts until such time as we have widespread economic pain - and the socialist sympathisers look to the private sector to dig us out. Whereupon I hope to see a new found appreciation in New Zealand for entrepreneurs, risk takers, innovators, hard work, hustle, efficiency and living within ones means.
Agree entirely Brock Landers - unfortunately the populace will continue to vote for short term handouts until such time as we have widespread economic pain - and the socialist sympathisers look to the private sector to dig us out.
This reads like a parallel universe New Zealand in which taxpayers haven't been bailing out private businesses and the property market year over year. A universe in which 60% of rental properties aren't receiving landlord benefits, and in which it's not the working Kiwis who pay the taxes while the socialist property investors get to freeload while often times also collecting their universal benefit, the only universal benefit NZ has.
What a different world it would be if we could find a party that rewards hard productive work instead of sitting around on our ass-ets. Maybe combining Land Value Tax on the unimproved value of land with lower income taxes on productive work.
I didn't know that. If so it disappoints me. The beehive is not overflowing with talent and experience. It seems as if it is always the best who leave. For example National would be better and look better with B. English and S. Bridges just sitting on the back benches.
National have turned to a new page alright but they better not blot it. Luxon needs to introduce a team that displays calibre & integrity and dispels any connection with the woeful & disgraceful identities & antics leading up to 2020. Quality is starting to arrive in the like of Willis, Bishop, Stanford and Dr Reti remains a pillar of strength. More of the same substance please.
The right love a career politician now...? Couple of years as a lobbyist, then a politician, and now he's the bastion of great governance...? They were worried about selling fish and chips and working in a political office, but now ciggies...that's a different matter!
Yep, I have to say I also reluctantly voted for Labour, but that won't happen again. I can't stand watching our PM talk down to us, nodding like we are pre-schoolers. The gap between the rich and poor has grown, crime is up, Police are impotent, housing is over-priced (for poor quality homes), hard working Kiwis are being squeezed ... fool me once.
Or worse. The mealy mouthed circle of words, saying nothing by accentuating what is plainly obvious to all. For example recently in explaining that she did not have the mettle to face up to Louisa Wall’s valedictory speech viz. “Ultimately, as you can see by the facts there was a different candidate selected in Louisa’s seat” Utter claptrap. As I got told once in an executive meeting if you’ve got nothing to say, then do it by keeping your mouth closed.
"Lack of electoral charity begins at home."
Good thing the government has such a stellar track record of delivering on their campaign promises to fall back on then. Oh, wait.
Voters aren't idiots. Price rises in NZ have been rising for years ahead of wages now. Attempting to blame Covid or the Ukraine is cynical at best. It's just the latest excuse for why nothing we were told was hugely important has actually been done.
NZ First at 4 per cent? I might vote for them now that they've got a chance to get back in.
I won't vote for Labour because of 3 waters.
I won't vote for the Greens because of their co-leader's plan to use the public works act to confiscate assets to give to Maori elites.
I am very reluctant to vote for National because it will be back to beneficiary bashing and doing nothing except giving rich people the biggest tax cuts. Although right now it is a case of limiting the damage being done to New Zealand by the current regime.
National should put Winston Peters in in Tauranga to guarantee themselves a coalition partner in addition to Act. Then they wouldn't have to make compromises on Maori co-governance if the Maori party hold the balance of power after the next election.
Surprised CT sees it so clearly from his vantage point... already. Labour politics is a mean machine for sure. We've family with Labour history in Victoria, Australia, which you could make movies out of they're so bad.
What JA cannot do any more is hide the hopelessness they've created by over-locking down just about everyone, for way too much debt ($50 billion plus) that will have to be paid back at increasingly higher interest rates by people who have not been born yet. Meantime, the real agenda surfaces through leaks & journalistic requests to the ombudsman & people of that ilk. They are taking us beyond the treaty, into a world where the few get to control the many, which ironically is also symbolic of this Labour Govts current MO.
JA & co are killing democracy quicker than a Trent Boult beauty catching the outside edge on its way to first slip.
As always from Trotter, an insightful article. Though he still talks about "if her magic runs out" when it is already long gone. Ardern won in 2017 because of Peters, and in 2020 because of the fear she, and her government installed in women. Along the way, she, and her cabinet, have been outed as the most inept, incompetent senior politicians this country has ever had. NZ is reaping what Ardern and Labour have sown, and it will take a long, long time to recover from this Governments 6 years in power.
I can tell you that Megan Woods is considered to be an idiot by the top echelons of management in energy, both in NZ and overseas. Her grasp of her portfolio is about as strong as a 5 year olds grasp of the theory of relativity. I do give Hipkins a tick because he admitted he made a mistake the other day (something that no one in Labour ever does), even though he was literally forced to on the spot. But still, he admitted. But again, having a student politician as leader and possibly PM, what could possibly go wrong?
This reads like a sponsored comment. Having worked with the top echelons of management in energy I have come to the conclusion that most them are inept.
To me a vote for a national/act coalition is a vote for privatisation so that the wealthier get better education, better health care and can continue to exploit our natural resources for their own gain.
"I have come to the conclusion that most them are inept". And you claim my comment reads like a sponsored comment kwbrn. Dare I suggest you believe that they are inept because they have a profit motive? Your claim that natural resources are "ours". Luckily, we have in NZ, the concept of private property. Perhaps you are in the wrong country, under the wrong form of Government.
Not so fast! Support? The last RM poll was 38 Nats to Labs 32.
Labour has lost the 26pt lead from 2020 and now is in deficit. This is after the last 13 polls. The last 5 have been within a whisker of each other.
I think they've run out of 'promises' and 'aspirations' and suckers I think?
I'm the same. Labour aren't perfect but no one is and it will take a lot for me to shift back to voting National again.
So far their housing policy is to remove the bright line test, put back interest deductibility, reintroduce foreign property buyers. Seems they just want to look after property investors. No thanks.
It's no wonder that Labour is plummeting in the polls, with so many issues affecting ordinary NZers.
As I see it, Labour has significantly alienated many of its traditional supporters, and those who supported Labour at the last election based on the handling of the COVID-19 situation leading up to the last general election.
The issues are, just to name a few:
1/ The Three Waters scam - which will inevitably lead to Ratepayers paying more for water, and losing ownership and control of the water assets.
2/ Racially based "co-governance", related to the Three Waters scam and separating out the provision of health care services by race. And more.
3/ Erosion of women's rights through the application of the sex self-ID law making it easy for men to claim they are women when they are not, and potentially harming female prisoners through the housing of male prisoners in women's prisons, and more.
4/ The Three Waters scam.
5/ The difficulty that Labour has had with the significant erosion of the real value of wages in relation to the cost of housing.
6/ The lack of stability in: the price of fuel, the price of housing, the price of groceries
7/ The increasing price of electricity caused by the application of government policy negatively affecting frugal users of electricity.
8/ The Three Waters scam.
9/ The relatively high and increasing inflation.
10/ The failure to effectively deal with persons who did not comply with public health directives.
11/ the massive cost and time overruns related to Transmission Gully state highway project, which hasn't significantly changed the bottleneck issue on public holidays.
12/ The Three Waters scam.
Many of these issues also have the support of the National Party, which means just because Labour has lost support doesn't mean National will pick up those votes.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.