What's up with Christopher?
Why isn't National steaming ahead of Labour?
As far as I can tell, the National Party leader Christopher Luxon is an approachable and intelligent guy. I’ve never met him, but I’d be happy to buy him a coffee. Not a beer, though, as I believe he’s never drunk alcohol.
So I’m wondering why most New Zealanders appear to lack confidence in him as a leader.
Luxon is much more likely to be rated as ‘out of touch’ and ‘untrustworthy’ than not. In two surveys, only 37% expressed confidence in him – well behind Hipkins who gets around 50%. (More polling figures are at the bottom of this post.)
Despite the cost of living crisis and majorities saying to pollsters that the country is heading in the wrong direction, Hipkins has been ahead of Luxon in all preferred prime minister polls in 2023.
Just when Luxon needs to have the incumbent government up against the ropes in a fight that could go either way, the viewers aren’t cheering for the guy in the blue corner.
It was once thought that the former CEO of Air New Zealand would make the whole country fly again. So why are people not responding well to him?
Luxon’s Christian conservatism may be hurting National and helping the libertarian ACT party; it may also be deterring people from defecting from Labour to National.
Luxon says he doesn’t want to change NZ’s abortion law, but it would only take a ‘pro-life’ member’s bill to make it into the House, and he’d be caught out. As a conscience vote, he’d be a hypocrite to vote against it – and, having promised not to change the law, a hypocrite to vote for it.
So I did some totally unscientific and random reading on Twitter. My question was: why do people on the centre-right (beyond that base of 37%) lack confidence in Luxon?
Some say that he’s bland and full of platitudes. Some are concerned that he’ll cave in to liberal agendas that they don’t like. Some find him inauthentic, but can’t explain why. It’s not just that people don’t believe what he says: too many people don’t believe in him.
Perhaps Luxon hasn’t found his natural footing as a politician yet, unlike John Key who seemed to connect with the middle class quite readily.
One of the most damning comments on Luxon said that he isn’t inauthentic at all. It’s just that people don’t like what he authentically is. Getting to know Christopher may be a problem, not a solution.
His CEO track-record may not be helping, as Luxon speaks high management, not middle Kiwi. His aspirations are those of an evangelical brand manager, not a trusted political leader.
Good leadership, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. Although New Zealanders don’t directly elect the head of government, campaigns often look and feel to them like a contest over which of two contenders will become prime minister.
Leadership X-factor does matter.
Should National swap leaders before the election, then? A similar change worked for Labour in 2017 when, with only seven weeks to go, Andrew Little handed over to Jacinda Ardern. But Ardern was already appearing in preferred PM polls at levels comparable to Little. National doesn’t have a back-up with ongoing popular appeal – or not yet. Nicola Willis’s recent appearances alongside Luxon raised her profile, and speculation has been rife.
But National will probably stick with the leader they have, use worn-out attack lines (like ‘Labour’s addicted to spending’) and give us a repeat prescription of tax cuts for the rich and boot camps for the poor. They’ve plagiarised the UK Conservative Party’s ‘coalition of chaos’ line; they’ve plagiarised Donald Trump’s idea of repealing two regulations for every new one they put forward.
On Budget day, Luxon promised repeatedly ‘to grow the economy’, as if it were a plant that prime ministers fertilise and water, and in spite of the fact that the predicted recession isn’t even happening. There may be a climate disaster and the emergence of AI to think about, but Luxon and his advisers have put their ’80s faves on high rotate.
Perhaps the reason why Luxon seems inauthentic to many people is that all his ideas are copied and pasted. None of it sounds like it’s him speaking. But would National be any better off if ‘the real Christopher Luxon’ stood up and took the mike?
For those who like to see the numbers:
A Newshub-Reid Research poll in early May asked, “Do you think the leaders are in touch or out of touch with the issues facing New Zealanders?”
Rounding out the figures, 50% said prime minister Chris Hipkins was in touch with their issues, while 36% said he was out of touch.
But only 37% thought Luxon was in touch with the issues, while 47% said he was out of touch. The remainder didn’t know.
Luxon compares poorly with his main rival here, and these figures resemble a Reid poll in late January that asked whether respondents trust the two leaders or not.
53% said Yes and 27% said No for trust in prime minister Chris Hipkins.
37% said Yes and 44% said No for Christopher Luxon.
Luxon became leader of National in November 2021, and their party polling rose significantly in early 2022, up to the high 30s, and even 40 at times, well ahead of Labour. But this lead has gradually fizzled out, and now the polling gaps between National and Labour are within margins of error, so we can’t really tell who’s in the lead. The differences aren’t statistically significant.
According to the July 2022 Taxpayers’ Union/Curia poll, Luxon's personal support dropped by 5.6 percentage points after the United States Supreme Court’s abortion ruling. That event may have reinforced a fear of having a PM who’s against abortion.
Luxon has declined to 16% as preferred PM, and no other National MP is on the rise.
Thank you for your fine writing Grant! And for this worthwhile question, for I believe we must look closely at its answer.
Why do we lack confidence in Luxon? Here's why:
1. He - and the National Party - avoid coming up with credible, alternative policies.
Some examples:
- After 8 people died and hundreds got sick with contaminated household water in Hastings, and with our collapsing local government water supply infrastructure, it's clear something needs to be done. National's answer, effectively, is to stick with the status quo.
- The economic policy package proposed by Luxon and National is pretty much the same as that offered by Liz Truss. Ask them to clearly explain the differences. As a journalist I have written to senior National MPs about this and received no reply.
2. There is no mana in building a political platform on untruths. The oft-repeated thing by National that they are better at managing our economy is simply false. Data from 1970 till now shows that our country's GDP grows about 4% better under Labour-led governments, and is more that twice as much wrt to per capita GDP growth.
3. The 'good at business so I will be good for communities in leading the government' line employed by Luxon (and Key before him) is clearly, demonstrably a crock. Just two examples: Remember that Key, the supposedly savvy businessman, committed our nation to spending $200 million of Kiwi taxpayers' money on fraudulent carbon credits with the Eastern European Mafia. And Luxon, who opposes subsidies in public transport was the CEO the most heavily subsidised public transport operator in NZ's history.
4. He's clearly for the rich; and a purveyor of the usual overarching National policy, that in Helen Clark's memorable phrase 'dare not speak its name.'
6. National and Luxon pursue policies that have been widely proven not to work. One example: they refuse to consider a capital gains tax or a higher tax regime, saying their approach will lead to advancement for New Zealand society and our economy. Yet every single one of the countries that are above us in the HDI have capital gains tax and higher tax regimes.
7. Luxon has demonstrated zero affinity for the New Zealand environment or any of our seminal environmental challenges.
8. And then there's the hypocrisy thing (let alone the medieval mindset) about not allowing women choice over what happens with their bodies.
Anyway - keep up the good work! BTW what's your email address? Mine is alzzstone@gmail.com
All the best
Alex Stone
Here in Australia we had a slick right-wing Christian PM recently - it didn’t go well. Perhaps Kiwis are (rightly) dubious about religion getting mixed up in politics?