PM demands pollsters leak month old polling!

The Herald reports:

After a grim Newshub-Reid Research Poll for Labour saw the party trailing National by 8.4 per cent, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told interviewers on her weekly morning media round that Labour’s internal polling had the two parties effectively neck and neck – and appeared to goad supporters into making those tightly-held polls public.

“Now in our polling, which is regular, National and Labour are neck and neck. And so that feels like a fairly accurate representation right now,” Ardern told TVNZ’s Breakfast programme, noting that media companies tend to poll less frequently than political parties.

Ardern made similar remarks on RNZ’s Morning Report and expressed some surprise that the figures had not entered the public domain, presumably by being leaked.

“I’m surprised they haven’t come out because they are often party of corporate briefings by the company that does ours [polls]. I’m sure they’ll find a way out,” Ardern said.

The Herald later obtained the most recent figures from Labour’s internal pollster, Talbot Mills. They are from the organisation’s October poll.

The poll had Labour and National on 35 per cent each, with Act on 11 per cent and the Greens on 9 per cent. NZ First were on 4 per cent while Te Pati Maori were on 2.2 per cent.

This is almost hilarious. Because the Newshub Reid Research poll conducted in late October and early November was bad for Labour, she demanded someone leak the Talbot Mills corporate poll to refute it. The only problem is that poll was done almost a month earlier, in late September and early October.

I did wonder why the PM didn’t simply release her own internal polling, which is done daily?