Luxon faces existential threat after torrid week and damning poll

2026-03-06 - 03:56

Comment: As a self-confessed cricket tragic, Christopher Luxon would usually have delighted in the Black Caps’ demolition of South Africa in the T20 World Cup semi-final. It was about the only good piece of news he had this week, after a series of gaffes and a damaging poll that has left him to figure out how – if at all – he can stay in the job. In a blow to nominative determinism, Luxon has hardly been blessed with an abundance of luck during his time in charge, best demonstrated by the US-Israel strikes on Iran last weekend that sparked his first bout of bad news. The Prime Minister could hardly be blamed for the actions of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, and other world leaders have also struggled to strike the right balance in their response – but Luxon’s dismal effort to articulate his coalition’s stance was yet another reminder of how ill-equipped he seems when it comes to public communication. Whatever credit he earned from his subsequent backdowns was overshadowed by the flubs that rendered such retractions necessary. At a diplomatic function in Wellington this week, one attendee privately noted that Luxon was getting worse, rather than better, in communicating his government’s policies to the electorate. Tellingly, the Prime Minister’s office seems to have cut back his media engagements outside of his near-mandatory broadcast slots and appearances at Parliament, having him spend his weekends behind closed doors where a more confident leader might otherwise schedule a light-hearted photo opportunity or two. The “antisocial blowback” on Luxon’s social media accounts that Newsroom’s co-editor Tim Murphy so ably documented last month has shown no signs of subsiding, either. Quite the opposite: one Facebook post this week, where the Prime Minister highlighted the Government’s record on law and order, had several people asking what world he was living in. John Key and Jacinda Ardern had their fair share of online critics too, but at least they were balanced out by more enthusiastic supporters – something Luxon can’t honestly claim. The real hammer blow came on Friday, with a new poll from the Taxpayers’ Union showing the National Party falling nearly three points to just 28.4 percent – down almost 10 points from its showing at the 2023 election, and approaching the depths that accounted for previous leaders Simon Bridges, Todd Muller and Judith Collins. Equally alarmingly for National, it is now outstripped by Labour on which party is best at not increasing taxes, perhaps a reflection of the LNG tax/levy/”net saving to Kiwi households” debacle. The poll numbers appear to have set alarm bells ringing, with National’s deputy leader Nicola Willis frankly telling Newstalk ZB the party’s vote share was “not a good number” and Luxon reportedly considering his future. At one level, it might be hard to understand why these particular poll results have put the Prime Minister in such peril. After all, the headline finding is of a piece with most recent polls – a coin-toss between the left- and right-wing groupings in Parliament, with the Labour/Greens/Te Pāti Māori combination sitting on 61 seats to National/New Zealand First/Act’s 59. But National’s declining share of the vote within the coalition is a threat not just to list MPs, but senior Cabinet ministers in purplish electorates like Chris Bishop (Hutt South) and Shane Reti (Whangārei). Any second term would almost certainly end in oblivion, too, with an even weaker ‘main’ party moving to the beat of its junior partners. At this point, it feels safe to assume that Luxon is incapable of charming the public in any meaningful way. The one glimmer of hope he and his Cabinet colleagues were holding on to – nascent signs of an economic recovery – have now been thrown into peril by the Iran strikes and the knock-on effects for global trade. What may help the Prime Minister, at least for a short period, is the lack of an obvious frontrunner to replace him. Murmurings about a challenge by Chris Bishop late last year ultimately fizzled out, and it is unclear whether he has the numbers to force Luxon out. Erica Stanford, Mark Mitchell and Simeon Brown are among the other names thrown around (whether as leader or deputy), but each comes with risk. A last-minute change of leader in opposition, as when Jacinda Ardern stepped in for Andrew Little in 2017, is one thing; doing the same in government feels even more desperate, and is not a manoeuvre with any record of success in modern New Zealand politics. Labour in 1989/90 tried moving from PM David Lange through PM Geoffrey Palmer to PM Mike Moore but suffered a hiding; National moved from PMs Jim Bolger to Jenny Shipley in 1997 but suffered defeat in 1999 as well. The Ardern to Chris Hipkins move of the prime ministership three years ago, ditto. Then there is the matter of coalition management. Winston Peters and David Seymour signed up to govern with Luxon – how will they feel about a hypothetical successor, particularly one who tries to trim the length of their leash? Such concerns may pale in comparison to the current reality facing National: that of a leader and Prime Minister who resembles a wounded animal, trying to find shelter and praying for a miraculous recovery.