Last weekend saw a continuation of right wing parties coming out with inane policy announcements that make a media splash without any hard questions being asked.
NZ First came up with a typical dog whistle proposal that only citizens should receive superannuation. I know quite a few people with residence status who have been here for decades. They have paid taxes, raised children and contributed to their local communiteis and are just as valuable as those of us with kiwi passports, the ones with “Aotearoa” on the front page.
The policy announcement implies that this could save the country a billion dollars a year which is ludicrous. If they were able to being this in as a policy all that would happen is more long term residents would seek citizenship, which they are perfectly entitled to do.
Act made a big splash on the weekend about its Climate policy and managed to get some media attention. The funny thing is that the policy is no more than a rehash of its 2023 policy with a few deductions.
Recycled policies include the Carbon Tax refund, scrapping the net zero target by 2050 policy, repealing the Zero Carbon Act, and linking our emissions profile to those of our trading partners.
They have removed screapping the reduction of net emissions by 50% by 2030, presumably because they have already achieved this goal. There is no way that the country can halve emissions by 2030.
In 2023 they also proposed a virtue signalling law removal policy. This has clearly been achieved by a the enactment of a series of virtue signalling law changes like reinstating oil and gas exploration, sabotaging the goal for 100 percent energy removal and getting rid of the Clean Car Discount scheme.
They also want to sabotague the ETS by allowing the market to be manipulated and presumably slump. This particular policy makes no sense. The Government is facing a significant bill to the tune of billions of dollars because emissions are not decreasing rapidly enough. If the ETS was working prices would be significantly higher than they are now.
Discouraging farm conversions is a new one and no doubt a reflexive response to rural communities. At one level I do agree with them. Planting Pine forests has its own issues. If they planted native forests however the benefits are more long term and the downside lessened.
To top off the crap policy announcements National promised to back first home buyers by making it easier for first home buyers to access the 5% deposit scheme. Their commitment to first home buyers can be seen by the decision taken in 2024 to scrap Labour’s first home buyer grant scheme and in 2025 by increasing the amount of lenders mortgage insurance paid by first home buyers from 0.5 percent of the loan amount to 1.2 percent. Previously the Government helped subsidise the cost of the insurance but in 2025 decided that first home buyers should pay the full amount.
The cost of this new policy announcement is effectively zero because richer first home buyers will still have to self insure. And these are the people more likely to not need the scheme in the first place.
So three policy announcements looking for soundbites and bait for racists, climate change deniers and appearing to do something for first home buyers when in reality they are doing nothing.
And little media analysis of what happened.
Which brings me to Labour.
On the ground they are fighting a very effective campaign. But head office needs to step up. My personal view is that policy announcements are too technical and we need to present a vision. Something along the lines of someone to love, somewhere to live, somewhere to work, and something to hope for, or no nukes or lets do this.
This campaign is Labour’s to win. But it has to light a fire among the electorate and a burning desire for change for the better.
A couple of comments.
PREFU is 29 September. They could be waiting for that before spelling out policies and costings.
Labour does not have the financial war-chest that the right has. Perhaps any major spend is going to be concentrated into the last couple of months.
Maybe, but that shouldn't stop them shouting about Nationals lies from the rooftops.
Housing 5% Deposits approved where is that going to end up for some 1st Home Buyers ???
Perhaps reviewing the USA Savings & Loan crisis period 1980-1990s would be of value here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savings_and_loan_crisis and
Academic library : https://ebrary.net › 123019 › business_finance › savings_loan_crisis
US SAVINGS AND LOAN CRISIS – Academic library Mortgages as a percentage of financial assets fell from 73 percent in 1960 to 51 percent in 1986 (Brumbaugh and Carron 1987). Historically high interest rates led to insolvencies in the savings and loan industry in the United…
Further!! Why are we giving that poll credence? They have been questioned on their methodology before, and left the Association to avoid closer scrutiny.
They ran favourable polls till they didn't. Trust has to be earned, not given by media,
Sadly, we have sour inward looking people on the left, just as we have arogant self promoters on the right.
The lying by some parties is so blatant, but not questioned by the media.
Chris Hipkins says he wants to see the books to underpin promises. Seems reasonable.
The playing field of the election has been tilted, the rules changed, the war chests padded by the sorted, while the poor have given to the Labour Party to go toe to toe in a last meaningful push.
I am biased towards the left, as they do try to stop people dying of homelessness, dying in ED, being super hungry and distressed, to provide benefits or parts of benefits to assist.
The CoC have failed miserably, and have damaged our standing in many areas.They have to go. Along with their cruelty lies and awful attitudes.
Agree 100%.
Also I understand the Anti-Maori Narrative now, it is a diversion to create animosity in Society, to distract from the main issues which are going on inside the Government.
Ugly. Dirty Politics 101.
What poll? There doesn't seem to be one mentioned in the OP – which is about policy announcements.
If you mean the latest Curia poll – the results are similar to the Roy Morgan one. Do you also have an issue with that polling company?
Patricia, why are you talking about a poll at all? There is no poll mentioned in MS’s post.
Assuming you mean the Curia poll, criticism should be based on its methodology and record, not simply the politics of its sponsor or owner. Curia’s final poll before the 2023 election was the third most accurate of the major published polls, measured against the final party vote result. National has used Curia for years for a reason.
Don’t let the right wing associations persuade you that the polling itself must therefore be unreliable. Dislike the messenger if you wish, but don't ignore the numbers out of hand.
What’s the basis of this utterly meaningless claim?
And you have us believe that reason is accuracy? If so, it is utterly naïve.
Haha you should ask Luxon what he thinks about Curia polling.
He said they were using another source.
Last 2 paras of the OP: yes, 100% this.
It doesn't matter what people on the Standard reckon. No swing voters here.
I'll say again: it's not "what are the policies?", it's "what policies do the voters know?".
And again: Ask them. They're not living in the echo chamber, they're not on the Labour website. If anyone in the Labour campaign thinks that the party is cutting through, they are seriously deluded.
Big announcement on climate change today: so what was the takeaway? The soundbite, the attention-grabber? It's … a review.
This is what cuts through …
Jacinda Ardern's rallying cry: Climate change the nuclear-free moment of her generation – NZ Herald
(never mind the later disappointment in government, we're talking about election campaigns and messaging here. Labour have done it very well before. They aren't doing it now).
Agree! Even Labour supporters struggle to say what Labours policies are, the general public hasn't got a clue what labours offering.
The right can just say "tax cuts here" the left has to make voters fall in love with them, it has to get people excited for change, Jacinda in 2017 ran a populist lite campaign modeled after Trudeau and Obama, it was less about policies and more about the message and the energy, the message being sent was "change is coming" (whatever the vague change was was irrelevant) saying bold sounding things excites people.
Obama, Jacinda and Justin Trudeau campained as social democratic populists, once in power they all governed as moderate status quo centerists
Chris Hipkins campaigns how Jacinda governed, not how Jacinda campaigned, had Jacinda campaigned how she governed Labour would have barely got 30% in 2017
Hipkins is utterly incapable of delivering the kind of campaign the left needs to get voters to fall in love and he's no Helen Clark (whose small target campaigns were still much more hopeful and ambitious than Hipkins labours zero target campaigns)
It doesn't matter how Labour campaigns or what labour campaigns on, the public tuned Hipkins out three years ago and the more they see him the more labour goes down in the polls (excluding the Roy and Curia labours polling trend has been downwards for a while, because the closet we get to election the more we see of Hipkins and the more we go "hard pass")
Labour needs a new leader. It's needed a new leader since 2023. He honestly shouldn't have been made leader after Jacinda retired, his brief tenure as pm resulted in caucus instability and minister after minister shitting the bed, he is not a communicator, he is not someone who inspires people, he's not a reformer, he's not even as hateable as Luxon because he doesn't inspire people enough to be hated or liked.
Anyone who wants this government gone should be calling for Hipkins to step down, we have two months, that IS enough time to run a campaign, in fact the shorter the better it gives the right less time to sharpen their attacks against a leader, last time he got labour their worst electorate seat result in history, I fear this time we're talking a Bill English 2002 result with the labour vote being split between greens top tpm and NZf and labour going historically low.
There is nothing he can do, say or promise, people tuned him out years ago, hoping Hipkins has been keeping his powder dry and is miraculously in the 11 hour going to change his entire personality is coping with what we all know to be the truth, he's not gonna be the guy to get labour back in power
I think Labour will get a new leader, but it won't be until November the 8th.
Don't let any moron bank economist or foolish PM or Finance Minister tell you that the economy is getting better.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/politics_election-2026/1298748/pm-christopher-luxon-s-targets-jobseeker-numbers-climbing-almost-80-000-over-target
Unless you live from Christchurch south to Invercargill, and are not a young person or Maori or Pacific islander, it is absolutely getting worse.
For the other 4 million New Zealanders living north of Christchurch it is getting worse in inflation, interest rates, rates, fuel, groceries, career prospects, wage and salary increases, electricity, and damn near everything else.
Scrap this , register this, fun fact I paid the ute tax , then missed out in the housing grant 2nd chance, I want government to make policy that lasts years not till the next election.
What I can say to you is that National wants to win at all cost and lead Coalition Mark II, and that they’ll fight as dirty as the voters will let them get away with, often through proxies and the likes. Obviously, we cannot rely on social media to level the playing field, so the few remaining honesty pockets in mainstream media will have to work hard(er) to expose the BS & lies.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2026/09/07/brown-wont-define-nationals-ai-attack-ad-policy-as-parties-draw-clear-lines/
The other side of the coin is that there’s nothing quite like a Leftie fighting another Leftie.
I think we need to bear in mind that Labour’s campaign isn’t necessarily aimed at left voters. It’s aimed at the softer centre-left edge of National’s vote: people who wanted a change in 2023 and are now regretting that decision.
In which case, being boring, middle-of-the-road and, at best, a bit meh may actually be the strategy.
But that doesn’t mean that has to be how Labour actually governs.
Sure, it’s easy to demand more. More energy. More stories. More breakthrough. More fire. And yes, maybe those things would help Labour poll better.
Maybe this strategy works. Maybe it doesn’t. But even if it doesn’t, that doesn’t mean the counterfactual would have worked any better. A louder, bolder campaign might energise more people. It might also repel exactly the voters Labour needs to win back.
We don’t get to observe both elections.
Surely with the two main centrist parties combined below 60%, that shows that the centre isn't where it's at anymore.
Folk are over the status quo.
60% of voters disagree.
60% and dropping.
9 years ago they shared over 81% of the vote.
https://www.electionresults.govt.nz/electionresults_2017/
Given that Centrists are the only ones who transfer their votes between left and right blocs – and therefore change the government, then by definition they are always "where it's at"
A shift from Labour to Green or from National to ACT has no impact on whether there will be a right or left government. A shift from National to Labour, does.
Historically, a shift to NZF had the same potential consequence – but, it looks like, not in this election. It remains to be seen whether a vote for TOP will do the same.
That’s inaccurate and an oversimplification in so many ways.
I seriously doubt that there are many people who previously voted ACT or Green (and therefore are not in any way Centrists) – who have transferred their vote to a party in the other bloc.
FWIW, I share your specific doubt because I have some evidential support for it. However, for many reasons, your absolute comment @ 8.1.2, without any doubt, was inaccurate, oversimplified, and nonsensical, irrespective of what you ‘seriously doubt’ or not. I have no doubt that you’re perfectly capable of working it out without my help, so let’s just call it a slight BD hallucination and move on.
Yes, but I think there are two slightly different things going on.
The combined Labour/National vote being below 60% is pretty good evidence that people are dissatisfied with the status quo and the old major-party duopoly.
But that dissatisfaction is being driven largely from the flanks of the two major parties. National is bleeding voters to ACT and NZ First; Labour is losing some to the Greens and elsewhere.
That doesn't necessarily mean the voters in the actual centre have disappeared or become radicalised.
And electorally, Labour obviously isn't going to win back someone who has left National because they think David Seymour isn't getting enough of his programme through.
The voters Labour can plausibly move are still much more likely to be softer National voters, non-voters, and people sitting somewhere around the Labour/Green boundary.
So I think both things can be true at once: the political centre as an institutional settlement is weakening, while the median persuadable voter Labour needs to win may still be fairly centrist.
This is important:
ASA partly upholds complaint against 'misleading' National attack ad | RNZ
Not only because of the ruling itself but as a warning of things to come. Of course National's rationale is the usual political trick: confident that coverage of the lie outweighs coverage of the correction. It will work unless Labour have a sharper, faster, smarter rebuttal system in place. Within minutes, not days. The ASA and its slow process is not going to cut it.
"They lie for breakfast, they lie for lunch, they lie for dinner"
There's a soundbite. A headline. Not a wordy press release that barely gets noticed.
(Edit: Brown’s rebuttal is in the story. But … “RNZ has approached Labour for comment”. Not good enough.)
The right always win the BS narrative as that's the role of their owned media.
Provide a soapbox, ask no questions, publish without context or fact checking. Rinse repeat and sprinkle with the usual opinionators which there are many.
Removing the BSA was deliberate and they're banking on Hipkins bringing knives to their gunfight.
Long way to go, very winnable IMO if the message is concise, consistent and you don't let this BS stand. Give NZ a vision and call out their BS !