Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: I can't tell you what's going to happen to Luxon tomorrow

Obviously, what everybody in politics is talking about today is what’s going to happen at the National Party caucus meeting in Wellington tomorrow morning, regarding the Prime Minister’s ongoing leadership.

Now, I can’t call it. I can’t tell you what’s going to happen.

On the one hand, the Prime Minister is under more pressure than he was before the weekend because of last night’s One News-Verian poll. Usually, that poll is quite generous to the National Party - it tends to overestimate National to a degree.

But last night, not only did it put the National Party at 29.7 percent, it also predicted a change of Government. That means this becomes not just a backbenchers losing their seats problem, but a ministers losing their jobs problem.

On the other hand, Luxon has managed to get himself through a tough round of media interviews this morning with grit, steel and confidence. And his chief troublemaker, Chris Bishop, has now ruled himself out of the leadership in that Q&A interview yesterday, which surely means the move against the Prime Minister has lost some momentum.

There has been a lot of poo-pooing of the polls, which I frankly just do not buy into. I have not seen any evidence that we have the kinds of polling trouble here in New Zealand that they’ve had in the UK, the US or Australia - where the polls call it for one side and then the other side basically comes through.

Largely, we don’t have that problem because we run MMP. They run first-past-the-post systems. And that actually matters because just a little bit of inaccuracy in those countries’ polling can mean quite a big surprise if a bunch of marginal seats fall in a way you weren’t expecting. We don’t have that here - our mistakes in polling marginal seats get smoothed out by the party vote.

Also, National is now sitting at around 29.7 percent in four polls in a row and there was another one about six weeks ago that started this all off. That means what you saw last night is not a rogue poll - it’s a trend. Choosing not to believe the polls feels like the last refuge of those who are in complete denial about what’s going on here.

But ultimately, it’s not really up to us, is it? It’s not up to us as voters and it’s not up to us as commentators. It’s up to caucus - the National Party caucus.

If the Prime Minister can get himself through tomorrow and then weather whatever happens in the seven days after that and then get himself through caucus Tuesday week - so he’s got two caucuses to get through - then he will most likely survive until at least well after the Budget.

Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and commentator who hosts Newstalk ZB's Drive show. This article was sourced from Newstalk ZB.