If National is now winning the election, it will be because they have finally started talking about the things they're good at: education and crime. Thank you very much to the Mongrel Mob for the latter. Not that annoying "nine new taxes" nonsense that wasn't working.
Now, I don't want to say "I told them so" but you heard me tell them so, right?
They've gone from being neck and neck with Labour for weeks to suddenly pulling ahead, 32% to 27%. They were never going to win on the "nine new taxes" stuff. It was too boring and was repeated too often. More importantly, they were never going to win on the broader topic of the economy because that is no longer their strength.
Apart from farmers and people in rural areas, no one in the cities feels better off under National than they did under Labour. Their finance spokesperson does not have a track record worth campaigning on.
The other notable thing in the poll is that Opportunity has slipped slightly, from 8% in last week's One News Verian poll to 7% this week. That's not a big deal on its own but it is becoming a pattern. They fell in the Post-Freshwater Strategy poll from 6% to 5.4%. They are now under 5% in the Taxpayers' Union-Curia poll and that should worry Opportunity because they are now the difference between the centre-right winning outright and not winning.
If Opportunity crashes out and takes a large wasted vote with it, Luxon is home safe on election night.
For that reason, I'm preparing to eat my words on the claim that Luxon made a misjudgment by consistently ruling Opportunity out. He may well have been right. If they don't make it in, then he was right all along to try to push them below 5% and he was right to hold his nerve every single time he was asked to repeat that position.
It's a big call, though, because they are still mostly polling above 5% but they are now getting dangerously close to that threshold.
Either way, this may be the start of Luxon winning. If National keeps trending up and Opportunity keeps hovering around 5%, the path to victory becomes much clearer.
Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and radio broadcaster who hosts Newstalk ZB's weekday Drive-Time Show – where this article was sourced.
2 comments:
Absolutely wrong diagnosis HDA.
The coalition will be strongly returned because split voting is lawful , understood and available.
More voters understand implicitly that a double tick National is yesteryears election mantra.
The smart voter will not waste their Party vote by it being not counted through the Electoral Commission rules that National are polling low and sets won are high.
Electorate Vote Blue , Party Vote ACT or NZF
And what if you're wrong Heather ? And more importantly, what if Christopher Luxon is wrong ?
What if Top does get over the 5% ? And NZ First and Act don't get the balance to get the Coalition over the line ?
And late on election night Christopher Luxon is looking at an ocean of wasted party votes for National that could have gotten a massively increased number of seats for his coalition partners. Victory for a right wing coalition.
He won't sit at the Cabinet table looking at nothing but National ministers.
Instead it will be occupied by the racist Maori party and a bunch of sordid socialists.
And why does he feel he has the need or the right to take this gamble ?
Christopher has as much chance of looking very very regretful late on election night as he does victorious.
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