I rather suspect that most BFD readers would be inclined to smile at anything that makes a Guardian journalist weep. But, when the Grauniad is getting worried about Jacinda Ardern’s future, it might not be exactly time to pop the champagne corks — especially not when the likeliest alternative is Chris Luxon’s wet Labour-lite.
Still, there’s more than a touch of schadenfreude to be enjoyed.
Prime minister Jacinda Ardern’s chances of re-election are looking shakier, with new polling indicating that the country’s right leaning coalition has enough support to form government.
“Right-leaning” is, oddly, the Guardian being pretty accurate, for once. The Coalition of Luxon National/ACT kinda-sorta leans right, in that National especially aren’t quite as completely tilted as far to the left as Labour.
But, right now, it seems as though anything to the right of the far, loony left looks better to New Zealand voters.
The latest 1 News/Kantar poll, taken as the cost of living soars in New Zealand, marked Ardern’s worst result in the preferred prime minister stakes since her tenure as leader began. Despite falling three points as preferred PM, however, she is still ahead of National’s Chris Luxon, 30% to 22%.
The centre-right National party remained ahead of the Ardern-led Labour party, at 37% to 33%. If National joined forces with its traditional partner, the libertarian-right Act party, on 11%, the two would have enough seats to form a government.
The Labour party, meanwhile, if it combined with traditional partners the Greens, at 9%, would fall short of government. Its other potential coalition partner, Te Pati Maori, held 2% of the vote – not enough to push the left over the edge.
The best news in this is that, firstly, Te Pati Maori have been dethroned as kingmakers. Secondly, the gains have all been for ACT — who are at least “not as bad as Luxon”. Both Labour and National dropped two points — which has gone straight to ACT, who’ve risen four points. Even better, the Greens have slipped a point.
The poll comes with an election still more than a year away, and with time for Ardern’s government to rise in popularity again, but continue a months-long trend of slumping support for the incumbent government, as the cost of living rises and New Zealanders feel increasingly gloomy about the country’s economic outlook.
The Guardian
Sure, there’s a year to go, but this begs the question of just what, exactly, Ardern has got left in her arsenal. She’s failed at housing, child poverty, and now Covid. At this point, it’s hard to see even a wedding or pumping out another photogenic sprog saving her reputation.
Inflation is at a three-decade high, and rents are spiralling; even slightly-falling house prices have been outweighed by rising mortgage interest rates and a shortage of building materials.
Earlier this year, as prices started to seriously rise and incumbent governments the world over started to tug nervously on their collars, a Labour party insider put it to me very simply: “If petrol is three bucks a litre, we lose the election.”
Those of us who write about politics professionally don’t like to accept that the whole colourful drama of parliamentary life can be so easily swept aside by other circumstances, but it is largely true.
The Guardian
The prattling class can witter about kindness, climate change, or refugees all they like. For the ordinary punter struggling to keep a roof over their head and fill up their petrol tank, it all comes down to the economy, stupid.