National at 49%
March 21st, 2004 at 6:13 pm by David FarrarThe Goverment will be in despair. Despite all its best attempts to distract NZers by blowing up the atheist/marriage comments and the red herring of a Treaty Inquiry, the public are showing they can see through the smokescreen.
Tonight’s One Network News/Colmar Brunton poll results are (change from Feb 2004 poll in brackets):
National 49% (+4)
Labour 39% (+1)
ACT 2% (+1)
NZ First 4% (-2)
United Future 2% (+0)
Greens (2% (-3)
In terms of seats in Parliament, this would produce (change from election in brackets):
National 62 (+35)
Labour 50 (-2)
ACT 0 (-9)
NZ First 5 (-8)
United Future 3 (-5)
Greens 0 (-9)
Progressives 1 (-1)
This is assuming Peters, Dunne and Anderton retain their seats.
So on this poll National would have 62 seats out of 121 and be able to form a majority Government.
The poll also had Brash up 5% as preferred PM to 29%.
There was 69% support for an inquiry into the Treaty but that is an apple pie and motherhood question where people will say yes, even if sceptical of any good that may come from it.
No tag for this post.
March 21st, 2004 at 6:26 pm
However, Helen Clark remains the most popular PM on 39%, a clear ten percentage points ahead of Brash. This only goes to fuel my theory that New Zealanders are protesting at perceived inequality within our social infrastructure. Brash has certainly touched a nerve, however the onus is now on him to prove that those points in his “Nationhood” speech are accurate.
This will be a hard task, particularly when you consider they’re blatant distortions of the truth. Brash has deliberately misrepresented facts. So, whilst the public hunger for more, he won’t be able to deliver it. Instead (and he’s beginning to do this now), he’ll attempt to move the debate away from issues surrounding race, toward National’s more comfortable ground of pointing the finger at beneficiaries.
This will begin to sound all too familiar to the average Kiwi who is enjoying unbridled prosperity under this government, and the polls will begin to shift, before eventually stabilising. If Labour isn’t clearly ahead, then the two parties will be neck and neck.
This will make for an interesting election campaign…
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 7:00 pm
Can I have some “unbridled prosperity” too? You can start by not taking so much of weekly pay packet so I can increase my mortgage repayments.
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 7:26 pm
It’s interesting to note the collapse of the Green vote. After years of being at 5% or above, they’ve suddenly fallen to 2%.
I suspect the switchers have gone to labour to shore up the Labour vote, which indicates that Labour is still haemorrhaging swing voters.
–Peter Metcalfe
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 8:20 pm
GPT, I note you’re a student.
Fear not. You’re enjoying some of that unbridled prosperity even if you don’t realise it. Your student fee’s are infinitely less than they would have been under a National government, freeing up more of your income for those pesky mortgage payments… The interest you pay on your student loan (presuming of course you have one) has equalised. The demon once known as compound interest is no longer attached to your back.
Fee maxima protects those fees, keeping them in line with inflation whilst allowing profit-driven universities to continue making money. As a result, they can offer you more courses, better resources, and a fairer student:lecturer ratio.
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 8:57 pm
I have long been on record as saying the Preferred PM question means little compared to the party vote. For example just before 1990 election Bolger was under 10% as preferred PM yet National won by biggest ever margin.
However the general rule has been whoever is PM gets around a 20% boost for that question as incumbent. To have an the Opposition Leader at 29% is almost unheard of outside election periods.
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 10:43 pm
Perhaps I am missing something here but how can it be, in a strictly proportional system, a party with less than 50% of the party vote gets to muster more than 50% of the parliamentary seats? Could you explain how you arrived at your numbers, based on this latest public opinion survey?
Vote:March 21st, 2004 at 11:14 pm
Sure, National on 49% of the total vote would get a majority because it is over 50% of the effective vote, which ignores votes cast for parties that fail to make 5% or win at least one electorate seat.
In this poll votes for both ACT and Greens would be wasted, as they are both below 5% with no electorate seats.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 5:52 am
It’s interesting to see the polling. Personally, I’m pleased that Labour is up a point. What it seems to demonstrate is that Labour’s core support is stable in the high thirties/low forties, where it scored at the 1999 and 2002 general elections.
There isn’t really anywhere for National to go from here but down. I don’t see published details about policy specific preferences, but I suspect the public prefer Labour policy still in the majority of areas. The Govt has had a very rough time of it in the last month, and in normal course of events that would have seen an increase for National anyway.
The silver lining in the cloud is that politics, by being more competitive, should engage more people. I have every confidence that the more attention people pay, and the more they get engaged about these debates, the better it is for democracy in the country. It’s also going to be better for Labour, because eventually people’s attention will be turned to the issues which really fundamentally matter: education services, health, foreign policy, tax etc, and Labour’s got lots of good things to say on those.
There is also a serious problem for National if it manages to throw ACT and the other centre-right parties out of Parliament. In an election campaign, small parties come back ahead and big parties lose support, but if ACT doesn’t make it back in, that’ll be a strategic mistake just as Labour’s loss of the Alliance was in 2002. Under MMP, long run, you can’t stay in Government as a single party.
Long time til next election, but at least it’s going to be interesting
Jordan
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 9:42 am
Jordan – I think people also said National can only go down after last month’s poll
As for which parties may be out of Parliament, on that poll Labour will have no left wing allies in Prlt (Progressives are effectively part of Labour now) with the Greens out. United and NZ First would survive and both are more right than left wing.
I agree it is now going to be a very interesting 18 months and campaign.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 10:00 am
Jordan has a small point: Historically support for minor parties does tend to firm up during election campaigns. And Brash is very smart to talk down over-confidence — it wasn’t that long ago Labour was a polling in the mid- to high-fifties, and that turned out to be pretty soft as well.
Still, I wouldn’t be quite so confident about the size of stability of Labour’s base. After all, I don’t think the Greens are cross the threshold by going after National. And one might think Clark is just as keen as Brash to see Winston lose Tauranga and take his toxic waste dump of a party with him.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 10:59 am
Mr. Farrar says: “Sure, National on 49% of the total vote would get a majority because it is over 50% of the effective vote, which ignores votes cast for parties that fail to make 5% or win at least one electorate seat.”
Rubbish. It is simply not possible for a party with less than 50% of the party vote to command more than 50% of the parliamentary seats. Not under the current pr system.
The matter of minor parties who fail to muster more than 5% is irrelevant. Why? Because, all things being equal as they supposedly are under MMP, those below-the-bar parties’ votes are simply redistributed among the others who pass the threshold. And that, I’m afraid, would *still* leave the National Party short of a working majority–ie, it would remain stuck on 49%.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 11:12 am
From 28% to 49% in a few short months. Amazing. The minor party’s support has been decimated. With National at 49% it may drop but Labour is going to have to work hard to pick up that support that National may lose.
Helen is a slave to the polls and his feelers put out to the public by the way of possible U turns and smoke screens are not working. Helen will have to spend some of the budget surplus. Labour needs to make tax cuts later this year and hope her Maori MP’s are true Labour party hacks as they appear to be and fall into line.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 12:01 pm
You don
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 12:04 pm
Hi Kate,
BTW Mr Farrar is my father, I’m always David or DPF.
I am right, and you are wrong to be blunt. If you do not beleive me go to http://www.elections.org.nz/cgi-bin/elections/generateElection.pl and stick in the poll results yourself.
You said “Rubbish. It is simply not possible for a party with less than 50% of the party vote to command more than 50% of the parliamentary seats.”
Again you are wrong. Look at 2002. Labour got 41.3% of the vote but 52/120 seats which is 43.3% of Parliament.
“The matter of minor parties who fail to muster more than 5% is irrelevant. Why? Because, all things being equal as they supposedly are under MMP, those below-the-bar parties’ votes are simply redistributed among the others who pass the threshold.”
Indeed. And hence National on 49% of all votes would go to around 51% of the threshold votes.
“And that, I’m afraid, would *still* leave the National Party short of a working majority–ie, it would remain stuck on 49%.”
Nope. Because the ACT and Green vote is wasted and redistributed to all parties who do make the threshold, National would get a bit over 51% of the seats in Parliament.
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 2:26 pm
Rob Davies, trolling around, wrote: “Your student fee’s are infinitely less than they would have been under a National government.”.
And your income as graduated student is infinitely less likewise: how many new taxes did we get with Labour?
Vote:March 22nd, 2004 at 8:47 pm
rob davies I am 25 years old with no tertiary
Vote:skills I did not do well at school and was told by left wing academics only the best and brightest go to university.I worked to full time jobs since I was 17 driving vans and unloading containers 80 hours a week.I saved 60,000 dollars
and am now a succesfull business owner who employes 6 full time staff.I pay more to the government than you and your leftwing academic elitists where is my reward were is my tap on the
back for doing it the hard way but instead all I get is tax tax tax and pay more tax towards our young latte drinking lawyer labour voters who have taxpayer funded education where is my reward then.
March 23rd, 2004 at 11:46 am
Yo Tim – how do you know said academics were left wing? Eg at my old university, the biggest school in terms of student and staff numbers was the School of Management, a hotbed of conservatism I’m telling you. Not many leftwingers at law school when I was there either.
If you didn’t do well at school, then you don’t get to go to university straight off. I don’t understand what’s left-wing about that – that’s rightwing elitism, mate. (Which I agree with).
Latte drinking lawyers pay tax too, of course. And no one in the last 10 years or so has got a more than a partially-funded education from the taxpayer. (The education you got at school was completely funded, of course).
Finally, your reward is that you have a higher income – your successful business IS a reward.
No offence, but you sound as though you have a real chip on your shoulder.
Vote:March 26th, 2004 at 11:47 am
Tim, here’s your incentive and “pat on the back”:
In the government’s March tax bill, which Cullen hopes to introduce soon, a provision has been included which would allow small businesses to pay provisional tax in their first year of operation, and receive a 6.7% discount in their second year to avoid the “problem of double taxation….which afflicts many start-ups”.
The government is also planning to allow some businesses to base their provisional tax on their GST turnover.
This of course opens up an interesting wound. Why is it New Zealanders consider themselves as being so grossly over-taxed? A recent OECD report shows that “the single average production worker in New Zealand pays the third lowest tax, or at least the tax wedge is the third lowest of 30 OECD countries”.
I also understand there are more grants out for small businesses, and there’s some assistance from mentoring programmes
Vote:March 27th, 2004 at 5:30 pm
Dear Mr Davis
Vote:have you ever run a small business? Have you spent your time off working as an unpaid, unrecognised tax collector for the state?
If paid employees had to perform these unpaid duties, unions and the their Labour party stooges would be calling for a nationwide strike. This government has made the life of small business owners hell, your condescending ‘pat on the back’ is of no use, and no comfort.
Emily
March 27th, 2004 at 6:29 pm
I didn’t mean for the “pat on the back” comment to appear condescending, and I apologise if that’s what it sounded like. I said it in answer to Tim, who wondered where the incentives for small businesses are. He asked specifically for a “pat on the back”.
I totally reject the claim that this government has “made the life of small business owners hell”. That’s nonsense. If anything, small business now exists in a better environment than it did from 1991 – 1999. The changes in employment law have equalised the scales, once heavily in favour of the employer. I’m sorry, if you can’t run a successful business and look after your employees at the same time, then you shouldn’t be in business.
Life’s also hard for those on low and modest incomes Emily. I’m the product of a single-parent family. My mother (now attending university and undertaking her MA in New Zealand History and English) was on the DPB for much of my younger life. I can vividly remember having $0.10c on a Saturday, waiting for DPB Tuesday.
This government addressed those who needed help more, first. I would wager that as hard as your life might seem, you live comfortably. I’m taking a risk by making that assumption, but odds are in my favour.
In saying that, I certainly understand without your efforts, there wouldn’t be an economy to speak of. Small business has always driven New Zealand. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the fact you worked, so my mother and I could live. I feel an almighty sense of responsibility as a result. I’m indebted to this country.
I’m also a student. I won’t know how hard it is for you to work and turn a profit. What’s needed is a comfortable balance. You must understand you have a social obligation to your community, and to this country’s most vulnerable citizens. In turn, those citizens must understand they have responsibilities.
I’m confident this government is striking the right balance.
Vote:March 28th, 2004 at 10:50 am
Rob thanks for the sermon you are truly tailor made for the Labour party. But “Cullen ……. allow small businesses to pay provisional tax in their first year of operation” Anyone can pay provisional tax in the first year of business now and thus avoid so called double taxation. Cullen may well do your thinking for you but people in business generally don’t wait around for the government to wipe their backsides. If Cullen wants to do something for small business and provisional tax she can simply raise the provisional tax threshold from the current $2,500 to say $7,500.
As for the nearly the rest of what you say I would ask your university for a fee refund for that critical thinking paper you sat.
Vote:March 28th, 2004 at 5:35 pm
The venomous response from the reptile known as the ACTist Rectos is as one would expect.
I know it’s always been possible to pay provisional tax in the first year of a business venture, I was attempting to illustrate the fact Cullen was reviewing the possibility of allowing small business owners to receive a 6.7% discount in their second year of operation. An incentive if ever there was one.
Apparently, you’re the wrong Mr. Jung.
Vote:March 29th, 2004 at 8:13 am
Self employed and in your first year of business has Cullen got a deal for you!
Cullen will pay you a one off 6.7% on money you advance possibly for up to 21 months before payment is really due. But just don’t make a mistake in your first year working out how much money you are going to make or you will be paying the interest instead. This isn’t an incentive. Cullen has missed his calling and should be running email scams out of Nigeria. It’s very typical of the current government.
Sorry Rob not an Act voter. I particularly don’t like GST, which is a grossly unfair tax. GST along with income taxes your mum was paying while on the DPB played its significant part in you having only 10c on those Saturday mornings. In 5 years Labour has done nothing to reduce the tax burden for low-income families not that the high and mighty Labour elite have much do with these people anyway.
Vote: