Sentiment might be shifting again

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

After a string of political polls showing a finely balanced electorate tilting back towards Labour since Chris Hipkins took over as leader and Prime Minister, National and the Act Party will take heart from the latest Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll delivering numbers that would allow them to form the government.

The poll of 1000 people was taken from May 2-7, so covered the defection of Ikaroa-Rawhiti MP and former minister outside Cabinet Meka Whaitiri to Te Pati Maori on May 3 — which began being reported the afternoon beforehand.

It had National on 35.6 percent and Act on 12.7 percent, translating to 46 and 16 seats respectively, so 62 of the 120 seats. Against that Labour was on 33.8 percent (down 3 points since this poll was last taken a month earlier), the Green Party was on 7.0 percent and Te Pati Maori 3.7 percent.

It came out on the same day that National leader Christopher Luxon ruled out working with Te Pati Maori after the next election . . . a brave move considering numerous recent polls had shown Te Pati Maori in a “kingmaker” role, but acknowledging the obvious — that this was in name only, as the current Maori Party would not support the current National and Act parties.

Luxon took the opportunity to repeatedly label a three-headed Labour-Greens-Te Pati Maori government a “coalition of chaos”.

The day before, Whaitiri and fellow Gisborne-based MP Elizabeth Kerekere took their seats in Parliament as independents for the first time — Kerekere having just quit the Greens over the co-leaders’ handling of bullying allegations against her. The co-leaders of Te Pati Maori were ejected from the House after welcoming Whaitiri with a whakawatea without permission from the other parties or the speaker.

National has been ahead of Labour or equal with it in three of the five polls conducted since Stuart Nash lost all his ministerial portfolios on March 28 after a fourth incident of misconduct emerged.

Before that, in nine polls since Jacinda Ardern announced her resignation on January 19 and Hipkins took over on January 22, Labour was ahead in seven, National in one and the other was a tie.

That showed a significant turn in sentiment towards the Government under its new leadership with its “policy bonfire”, as National had been ahead in all 10 polls leading up to that, since late October.

It all makes for a fascinating political situation as we head into Budget week, five months out from the election.