Two poll results give faint hope to a once-great political party now listless and languishing. National needs to sort out first what it stands for, then choose the leader best suited to selling that message to NZ, writes Peter Dunne.
When National Party members and delegates gather at Manukau’s Vodafone Events Centre for their annual conference this weekend it will be against the backdrop of last year’s disastrous election result and the daunting realisation that they are still a long way from regaining office.
The heady days of early 2020 when the party’s leadership looked settled and momentum was building, with opinion polls showing National could be strong contenders to lead government after the 2020 election, are but distant memories. What became the Covid-19 bandwagon – or in National’s instance more the Covid-19 tumbril* – swept the Labour Party to a historic election triumph, that has left National floundering in its wake ever since.
National today looks a shadow of the party it was barely 18 months ago. Its number of MPs was reduced by nearly 40 percent at the election. The remaining MPs look dispirited, the party’s leadership now hesitant and uncertain, and the policy offering still near invisible. National seems increasingly divided and introverted, with too many internal issues still to be resolved before it can be again considered as a credible option to govern. In short, it is a far cry from the days of Sir John Key and Sir Bill English when National’s dominance seemed almost immutable.
However, political trends come and go, and in a proportional representation environment, small shifts can produce dramatic results, as National found to its cost, and Labour to its delight in 2017. In that regard, two recent public opinion polls, while still reminiscent of the proverb regarding swallows and summer, will give the National Party faithful turning up to their conference a sliver of hope for the future.
Both the Roy Morgan and Reid Research polls reported within the past week show Labour support dropping sharply, suggesting the party would no longer be able to govern alone should the poll results be reflected in a general election. Both polls show only slight upward movement for National, a bigger jump for ACT, and the Greens remaining relatively steady. More significantly, both polls show that the 58 percent of the vote received by the Labour/Green bloc at the last election has fallen sharply – down to 49 percent according to the Roy Morgan poll, and 51 percent according to the Reid Research poll.
While some of this loss of support will be due to public dissatisfaction with one or other aspect of government policy, much of the sharp drop in Labour support will be a form of natural correction because of the abnormally high Labour vote (50 percent of the popular vote) at the last election.
Normally, given the wasted vote (the party vote of parties that do not cross the threshold for representation), a minimum of 48 percent of the party vote for a particular bloc will ensure that bloc wins enough seats in Parliament to be able to form a majority government. So, if, as these two polls report, the Labour/Green bloc’s support is now around the 50 percent mark, and the trend is maintained, the next election begins to look like a more interesting contest.
On the other side of the ledger, the overall movement is just as significant. Support for the National/ACT bloc is up from 33 percent of the party vote at election time to around 41 percent in these polls. While National’s support has inched up to around 29 percent (compared to just under 26 percent at election time), most of the gain has come from a sharp lift in ACT’s support (just under 8 percent at election time, now nearly 12 percent).
Now, opinion polls are at best a snapshot in time so it would be unwise to determine the result of the next election based on these two polls, more than two years before that election is due. However, it is understood that these poll results reflect similar trends in current party internal polling which perhaps explains why the various political leaders have been less dismissive of them than usual. Moreover, as the excitement of the last election recedes in the public memory, more of those “never before” voters Labour hoovered up then are likely to fall away, meaning that by the time of the next election the gap between the Labour/Green and National/ACT blocs is likely to be around the 4 or percent it usually is.
That would ensure a genuine electoral contest of ideas once more. And that opportunity poses the biggest challenge to National right now. According to the publicity material for its forthcoming conference, National owes it “to future generations to make sure New Zealand delivers for them and we will be relentlessly focused on the things that will make New Zealanders’ lives better.” It talks of the need to “harness the upheaval caused by Covid-19 to drive meaningful change”. While it has outlined five priority areas for action, National has so far produced little meaningful specific policy to support its objectives.
When it does talk about Covid-19, its response is normally muted and mealy-mouthed towards the Government’s position, meaning it appears to the public as somewhere between having no real policy of its own, and broadly supporting what the Government is doing. Neither of which gives disillusioned or uncommitted voters a reason to hitch their star to National’s still lumbering wagon.
ACT, on the other hand, has operated under no such constraints. It has been both the most constant and vocal critic of the Government’s pandemic response, and the party most frequently promoting alternative solutions, and is being recognised in the polls consequently. While ACT’s views will never attract mainstream support, they do not need to. For example, if ACT can nudge its support up another 2 to 3 percent to around 15 percent, it will put real pressure on National to try to lift its support another 3 or 4 percent, so their bloc gets to the minimum 48 percent needed to form a majority government after the next election.
To show that it can become a serious contender for government once more, National, starting at its conference this weekend, will need to focus on two key areas. First, it will need to develop its “story” to the electorate – the “what it stands for” message, why that message aligns with New Zealanders’ mood and aspirations today, and why National is a therefore better “fit” than Labour to achieve those. The story needs to be sharp, future-focused, and specific but above all relevant to the contemporary mood. Then it must be conveyed clearly and simply to voters.
Second, National needs leadership committed to and capable of carrying out that task. It is not just a case, as some commentators seem to think, of changing the current leader and all will become well. The party’s leader must embody the party’s values and be unambiguous in promoting them. The leader needs to reflect the face of modern New Zealand, not appear like someone harking back to earlier times or attitudes.
As National found to its cost last year, changing the leader just for the sake of it is disastrous. Rather, the objective must be to clearly define National’s message and values first, and then back the best leader to promote them. Leadership is an area where National cannot afford to fail again, which is why it would be foolish to move precipitately to make change merely in response to the polls.
The latest polls are far from National’s salvation – the task ahead remains herculean. National’s conference needs to recognise that, put the wallowing in the past and the current internal rancour behind it, and to start to focus positively on prising open further the door of opportunity the polls suggest may have ever so slightly opened for it. But it will require more than just unified voices and staged photo-opportunities this coming weekend. It will require discipline, focus and commitment over the next two years at every level to lift National out of its trough.
This weekend’s Conference will show whether National is yet capable of even beginning that journey.
* The tumbril became notorious as the wagon that carted many to the guillotine during the French Revolution.
