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Leader's Letter
July 2004
Winston Peters: Ultimate Kingmaker
Nick Bryant - The National Business Review
4 June 2004
Winston Peters' New Zealand First party has crossed the political divide and is high on voters' list of preferred coalition partners for both Labour and National. New Zealand First is the big winner in the latest NBR-Phillips Fox poll, which has 21% of voters favouring it as the best coalition partner for Labour should it win the most votes at the next election, while 23% say it would be the best partner for National should it win the most votes.
Victoria University political scientist Professor Nigel Roberts said Mr Peters had become a skilled "bob each way" man, something the voting public recognised. "The most fascinating thing is you have a fifth of the electorate prepared to consider New Zealand First as a partner for both Labour and National, especially considering what happened to the National government last time they were in coalition.
"This reflects the strategy of Peters since ‘99, as a politician who learns lessons. He now has no unruly MPs, but in fact has the tightest band of brothers in Parliament, and he's consistently voted both for and against the government, right up to criticising the Budget last week but then voting for the Working for Families legislation. "So the public feel he's good for a bob each way, and no other party has managed to get that message across so clearly.
Poll:
Winston Peters becomes the maestro of MMP
Nick Bryant - The National Business Review – 4 June 2004
The latest NBR-Phillips Fox poll shows Winston Peters is transforming himself into an MMP maestro. He says the popular things at the right times and attracts large amounts of public attention for doing so and the results of this strategy are showing in the polls.
As the only party to have truly crossed the political divide although the Greens showed well with both Labour and National voters in this week's poll New Zealand First appears to be the only party to have grasped what MMP is all about. Not surprisingly, the Greens received strong support from those voters who favour Labour to win the most votes at the next election, winning 24% favourability.
Many might think this to be of little consequence in a real election situation, given the Greens' relationship with Labour. Surely their wild demands would make a sustainable coalition unlikely? Not so, according to Victoria University political scientist Nigel Roberts.
"It's parties like the Greens and Act that have nowhere to go, no elbow room.
"The choice for the Greens is to bring down a Labour government and end up with a National government.
"Because of the ideological position of those two parties they are more captive than the likes of United Future."
Professor Roberts said there were different factions within the Greens, such as those who think it's better to be out of government than in it, but he believed more would prefer to be part of a coalition. "I think the Greens would be pretty canny coalition partners but, that said, they actually don't have that much choice and Labour knows it."
After months of agony, it was finally a poll Act could take some solace from.
The struggling "liberal" party polled second to New Zealand First as best coalition partner for National, with 20%. This supports those in Act who believe tactical voting will once again see them breach the 5% threshold.
After all, Act polled only 2.6% compared with New Zealand First's 6.5% in last week's NBR-Phillips Fox state-of-the-parties poll. Professor Roberts said the poll was a good snapshot guide to minor parties, "a one shot pass if you like," but said it had limitations.
"The only reservation I have is that this is a poll that asks everybody [who they'd support should Labour or National have the most votes after the next election] rather than identifying first whether the respondent is a Labour or National supporter.
"Ideally, you'd want to break such a poll down by intended vote. "I'm not saying this poll has an element of malicious responding but if you're a National supporter who really doesn't care who supports Labour you might want to pick their worst option."
Professor Roberts said on the face of it though, it didn't appear that this was the case given the results.
The National Business Review-Phillips Fox poll
The UMR Research omnibus is a telephone survey of a nationally representative sample of 750 New Zealanders aged 18 or older. Fieldwork was conducted from May 20 to 24 at UMR Research's national. interview facility in Auckland. The margin of error for a 50% figure at the "95% confidence level" is ±3.6%. If there are any inquiries about this poll, please contact UMR Research on 0-4-473 1061 (phone),
0-4-472 3501 (fax) or umr@umr.co.nz (email).
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