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12:53 pm, March 9th, 2026 - 16 comments
Categories: chris bishop, Christopher Luxon, crosby textor, Media, Politics, spin, taxpayers union, uncategorized, winston peters -
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Winston Peters has been in this scenario before. Back in 1998 the National Party moved to replace Jim Bolger with Jenny Shipley.
The process was pretty brutal.
Wikipedia records that “Shipley grew increasingly frustrated and disillusioned with the cautious pace of the National-led government under Jim Bolger, and with what she saw as the disproportionate influence of New Zealand First”. This was the National Government that imposed Ruthenasia. At least Peters slowed the pace down although he had campaigned on changing the Government and then chose to support the existing Government.
But during the 1996 coalition negotiations Peters had built up a whisky flavoured rapport with Bolger during the coalition negotiations and subsequently. And Bolger did well in getting Peters to back National despite Peters’ earlier superficial opposition.
I can remember Peters announcement that despite cmpaigning on changing the Government he was going to support it well.
This and Helen Clark’s principled leadership caused my Rogernomics induced indifference to the Labour Party to evaporate.
The subsequent coup against Bolger was really brutal. Bolger was overseas at a Commonwealth Heads of Governments meeting when Shipley pulled the trigger.
No kanohi ki te kanohi type meeting and lets talk it out. Bolger came home to discover that Shipley had the numbers and he then resigned as Prime Minister.
Peters did not take it well and the coup was the beginning of the end of the Government in its original form.
As Tim Murphy notes:
After Bolger was rolled by Jenny Shipley in 1997, the two parties’ relationship soured to the point Shipley sacked Peters from the Cabinet in 1998 (sacking number two) and Peters and his MPs walked out of government. Peters managed 612 days in office this time. Some of his former party colleagues, however, led by minister Tau Henare formed a breakaway group of independents, later named Mauri Pacific, and kept National in power until the 1999 election.
The situation back then was slightly more complex than this. Peters pulled the pin after National proposed the sale of Wellington Airport shares and he publicly dissented.
Shipley gave this rationale for sacking him. From the press release at the time:
The Prime Minister announced today that she had advised the Governor-General to dismiss Mr Peters immediately from his Ministerial responsibilities as Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer.
On the Prime Minister’s advice, the Governor General has appointed Bill Birch to the office of Treasurer. Mr Birch will also continue as Minister of Finance.
Setting out the reasons for the dismissal in a letter to Mr Peters, Shipley said:
It is my view that you have shown a refusal to accept Cabinet collective responsibility. Further, you have publicly criticised Government policy regarding the sale of the Crown’s shareholding in Wellington Airport, and your actions and statements regarding the sale (which expressly or impliedly deny the right of the purchaser to rely on a sales process of integrity) are unacceptable. Further, your unfounded allegations in Parliament that I have breached some alleged undertakings make it untenable for you to remain as a Cabinet Minister.
The Government limped on with the support of ex NZ First MPs including Tau Henare, and other dissident NZ First MPs as well as ex Alliance MP Alamein Kopu.
MP Vetting back then was just a problem as it is now. Although I should note that I now have a lot of time for Tau Henare who in future years returned to his Trade Unionist working class roots.
It is clear however that at the time is that Peters wanted to exert some influence over who National chose as its leader.
And things have not changed.
This pre Christmas interview with RNZ shows clearly what he thinks. In particular:
” … when asked about speculation surrounding the prospect of a coup against Luxon, Peters said one reason he didn’t think there was a “spill on” was because no one had talked to him.
In fact, he was “astonished” he was only asked about it for the first time weeks after the fact.
“It’d be unwise to have a spill on unless you spoke to somebody else in terms of the continuance of the government.”
He said he’d signed an agreement with one person, and “you expect people who were behind that person at the time of the shaking of hands would respect that.”
“I’ve been here before,” he said, referencing shaking hands with former Prime Minister Jim Bolger not knowing at the time people were intending to roll him for someone who was “massively inferior in skills”.
So he will expect there to be a consultation and, shock horror, he will want to influence the decision.
This morning on Morning Report there were two very interesting discussions. Peters was asked about the leadership speculation by Corin Dann. He was asked if a change of leadership would make the ladership void.
He studiously avoided answering the question apart from saying that it was not his concern and it was not happening to his party.
Then Luxon was interviewed.
He said he was not thinking about standing down and was focussed on his job.
He said he had not needed to ask Cabinet Ministers if he has their support but then confirmed that they had expressed support for him.
He was asked if he had spoken to his backbenchers.
He said that he had not. Then he said he talks to backbenchers all the time. Verbal clarity is not one of Luxon’s strengths.
According to Christopher Luxon there is no issue and no threat to his leadership. Which jars with Peters’ refusal to talk about the subject.
Which makes you wonder why National’s own pollster’s latest poll was shopped by the Taxpayers Union to the media showing that there was a crisis in National’s support.
These are not independent players. They have an agenda. And the agenda does not look good for Luxon.
To add to this the name Crosby Textor, infamous for running dog whistle political campaigns, has popped up.
From Bryce Edwards:
One of the most revealing stories of recent days is the one about who Christopher Luxon actually listens to on polling. Because it’s not actually Curia.
In his NewstalkZB interview following Friday’s disastrous poll, Luxon distanced himself from Curia’s numbers entirely, saying he only looks at “the one that we do internally for ourselves… stuff that we actually get processed overseas, actually, to be honest, because there’s skills that we need, to process the data.”
Matthew Hooton, in his Patreon email newsletter today, has revealed the identity of this mysterious offshore pollster. It is Sancrox Political Advisory Ltd, a company incorporated in the UK in September 2023, closely associated with another firm called Fleetwood Strategy Ltd.
The key players behind both are Michael Brooks and Isaac Levido OBE, an Australian protégé of Lynton Crosby – meaning that both Freshwater Strategy and the Sancrox/Fleetwood operation trace their origins to the same Crosby Textor consultancy stable. The NZ Herald has confirmed that National has “recently brought back Sancrox (formerly Fleetwood) Political Advisory” for the 2026 campaign, with Levido “personally involved in the latest round of advice.”
Fleetwood was hired by National for its successful 2023 election campaign. As Hooton explains, Sancrox and Fleetwood don’t conduct their own fieldwork. They take the raw Curia data and apply their own re-weightings and statistical adjustments. This is why they provide Luxon with different numbers to the ones the public sees. Luxon no longer relies on Curia’s raw numbers. Instead National sends them to Sancrox Political Advisory Ltd in London.
According to Hooton, the account is now handled mainly by Zach Ward-Elms, Izzy Walker (a former National staffer), and Andrew Laidlaw, who works out of Fleetwood’s Melbourne office and performs the statistical adjustments. Laidlaw has previous New Zealand experience as a polling assistant at Crosby Textor during the John Key era and as a private consultant to National during the Simon Bridges leadership in 2020.
It seems pretty clear that unless polling for National improves soon there will be a move against Luxon in the near future.
And the actions of Taxpayer’s Union and Matthew Hooton and others including the previous attempt by Chris Bishop clearly point to an active campaign amongst National heavyewights to replace Luxon because they realise he is not up to the job.
And if this happens National will need to talk to Winston Peters about it.
And I don’t expect his response to be weighted towards National’s interests.
I'm detecting a move to distance themselves from National by both coalition partners as we approach six months to election time. They are seeking to increase their votes and National is the target.
Seymour's goal will be different as his natural coalition partner is National, but whether Luxon stays or goes would be of little difference to Peters. He wants a greater vote for NZF and despite what he says about not wanting to go with Hipkins, that could change in as quick as a time as it takes for him to say after the election "The people have spoken."
A three party coalition of chaos after November would be fragile especially if National's total vote is behind Labour. National could then dominate the coalition since they can threaten to go to an early election if their coalition partners' tails wag too hard. (I'm sure the centrists within National, that party being a coalition of urban liberals and country conservatives, are resentful of the influence that the minor parties have in this CoC.)
The most likely result of such an early election, especially if Labour is the most successful in November, would be a rejection of ACT and NZF by the voters who ditched National and sought a more inclusive government.
Interesting to hear former NZF MP and cabinet minister Ron Mark on RNZ this morning especially when rejecting the idea that ACT and NZF be typified as 'minor parties'. He sees them more as likely closer to equal with National.
"At the moment, in our government, he is the best prime minister that we have," Wedd told Stuff. "I think that Christopher Luxon … is doing a really, really good job."
Live: ‘At the moment’, Luxon is ‘the best Prime Minister we have’, says National MP | Stuff
Well if Luxon is the best they have then the bar in this govt for PM and leadership is really…really…low……no wonder Winston sounded rather cordial….even jovial this morning on RNZ…..
I'd be really worried if I were Luxon and heard this (but perhaps she 'misspoke")-"At the moment, in our government, he is the best prime minister that we have".
He's the only prime minister they have. He would have to be the best (and the worst) since there is only one such position with one incumbent!
Weasel words, misspeaking and misdirection all taken to new and lower levels by our coalition of chaos chorus.
Meanwhile ram raids, drug pushing teens and criminality feature in the news, the economy is failing and our men's cricket team are stumped. (Did Chris Bishop go for a photo op with the Black Caps btw?)
Next GDP number release is March 19,
Next employment release is May 6,
Next RBNZ interest rate announcement is May 8
and Budget together with Treasury PREFU is May 28.
Before Budget, all Ministers will know the scale of their portfolio cuts are, and they will be substantial.
They will also know how bad things are and how much worse the economy is going to get particularly with oil-driven inflation.
It is very hard to see either Luxon or Willis surviving all of those political earthquakes.
They've had time to adjust and tell us what their plan is. And because the don't have one, their support will continue to decline.
Feels so similar to the decline under Hipkins' PM time, but this time to National and mostly self-inflicted from public sector austerity and a brutal smashing of democratic checks and balances.
A very bad year for New Zealand but a terrible 2026 for National.
It’s April 8 (https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/news-and-events/events/2026/april/april-monetary-policy-review).
Doing a Muldoon and calling a snap election at tomorrow's post cabinet might be their best option. At least the pain won't be for as long, and they might have some (but declining) chance of success.
It would be very unlikely to be like the Muldoon snap election call.
Luxon doesn't drink I gather so we wouldn't get a call for a Schnapps election.
It would be, the announcement that is, much more like the early election called by Helen Clark in 2002. That one didn't work out very well for her of course and she didn't get the result she was hoping for so I doubt that they will go for the option.
Why on earth should Luxon want to call an election anyway? The Government remains stable and there is always hope of a pickup in the next six months. An alternative hope of course is that the world economy goes down the tubes and the people of New Zealand rally round the Government as the best option in uncertain times. Happened in 2020 didn't it?
Ad, there was a small but telling moment on his slot earlier today on Morning Report that confirms your comments completely.
As he went into his standard patter on the economy (which we all know by heart) he repeated his mantra and pointed to all the upcoming releases which will, apparently, give confirmation that 'inflation is under control' 'interest rates are coming down' GDP is going up' as if in the last few days we haven't had a tectonic shift in world politics that are going to sink virtually all his expectations.
A more savvy leader would have been quick enough to begin to modify his comments, and a more savvy interviewer would have pulled him up on it.
I guess the interviewer missed it amongst the plethora of "what I say to yous"
2. Based on Chris Bishops pre-christmas Claytons Coup (the coup you're having when you're not having a coup), he thinks he's Luxons natural successor. I personally don't think he would shift their polls much but the point I'm raising is he's their man for election campaign management, isn't he? If so, he either puts his hand in the ring and upsets the smooth transition to another leader, or National gets an un-blooded campaign manager, right when they need all the chances they can muster.
"pushed out the election date"?
How do you determine that? Since 1990 we have had 3 elections in September, 4 in October and 5 in December. The only odd one is 2002 when Helen Clark tried to take advantage of a good poll and ran in July.
As far as Luxon goes he is anything but right wing. Even by New Zealand standards he is a wet. By US standards he would be on the left of Bernie Sanders. So, of course was John Key. Trump isn't left, or right. He is just crazy.
The most important date for Luxon (remarking on Ad's post above) will be the next TVNZ-Verian poll. Those polls are usually "kinder" to National and have them approximately 3 to 5% above other polls like Curia.
If the next TVNZ-Verian poll echoes Curia, then Luxon is Dead Man Man.
If the poll is low-to-mid 30s, he lives to fight another day.
Either way, I want Luxon kept in situ as our current PM. He's the best possible hope for a Left win in November.
If he's dumped, his replacement could be more media saavy and coherent. That would change everything for the Left (and not in a good way).
You know Chris Bishop's speech, taking one for the team on turning the tables on Plan Change 120? I just played it in reverse, and I thought I heard it say "Luxon's dead man, miss him, miss him"
Luxon claims he has the full support of his caucus (“all of them”), which means two key conditions must be met: 1) Luxon shares the results of those ‘internal’ polls (processed in the UK) with all of his caucus, and 2) the processed numbers are as convincing as AI slop.
I have difficulty believing both are true. The first doesn’t align with previous practices of the National Party (https://www.1news.co.nz/2021/04/27/collins-says-nationals-election-review-contains-nothing-secret-after-internal-party-email-sent-to-media/). But if the second condition is true, then the NZ voters & public are not adequately informed by publicised polls and potentially misled (aka we’re being lied to) and this would be a huge concern for all of us. Something doesn’t add up here.
They haven't sacked him (fools!).
So the answer is "Winston will celebrate going up in the polls until National finally do what everyone knows they must do".
In the unlikely event that Luxon survives until November, the voters will sack him instead. What will Winston do? Call Chris Hipkins.
Yeah, I keep wondering what Luxon was doing at school when he should have been studying Shakespeare. Watching the blowflies mating or something maybe. Julius Caesar taught us when everyone who could be snapping at your heels is oozing support, treachery is not far away.
I was thinking who, if I was choosing his successor, I would pick and I think it would be Andrew Bayly. At least he didn't pretend to be anything other than a Born To Rule Tory, and I respect his sincerity, even if that ideology leaves me cold.