National takes a hit in Roy Morgan poll, Labour still under 30%

Wednesday 21st December 2016

The National Party has taken a 4.5 percentage point hit since the departure of former Prime Minister John Key on Dec. 5, but the Labour Party continues to poll below 30 percent despite a 5.5 percentage point jump in support, according to a regularly volatile opinion poll conducted by Australian pollster Roy Morgan.

In the month since the previous Roy Morgan poll, which put National at 50 percent and Labour on 23 percent, National has dropped to 45.5 percent support and Labour jumped to 28.5 percent. Combined with the Greens, unchanged at 14.5 percent, a centre-left coalition commands 43 percent support, just short of National.

Winston Peters's New Zealand First party was down half a point to 7.5 percent support.

The poll may not capture the full impact of the change as the sample of 872 landline and mobile telephone users started on Nov. 28, a week before Key resigned and covering Labour's trouncing of National in the Mt Roskill by-election, on Dec. 3. It ended on Dec. 11. Of all electors surveyed 5.5 percent, down one point, didn’t name a party.

The Roy Morgan poll is the first long time series poll to come out since Fairfax Media did a snap poll on the evening of Dec. 5, just after Key announced he was leaving politics, leading to his replacement by Bill English and the appointment of a new Cabinet last weekend.

"If a New Zealand election was held now, the latest New Zealand Roy Morgan Poll shows it would be a very close result," the polling agency said.

Among the government's three support partners, the Maori Party slipped half a point to 1 percent support, Act fell half a point to 0.5 percent and there was no measured support for United Future.

Roy Morgan also measured a hit to the government confidence rating, which fell 10 points to 131. New Zealanders saying the country was "heading in the right direction" fell 6.5 percentage points to 58.5 percent, while pessimists rose by 3.5 percentage points, at 27.5 percent.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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