Stuff has launched their YouGov poll and the inaugural poll is bad news for National and Simon Bridges.
Labour and its coalition partners are riding high while National has dropped below 40 per cent support in a recent Stuff/YouGov poll.
The poll put Labour at 41 per cent support, National at 38 per cent, both the Greens and NZ First at 8 per cent, and ACT at 2 per cent.
On these numbers Labour could govern with either the Greens or NZ First with a tight 61-seat majority, while National would have no path to power.
No path and no friends. But it gets worse. YouGov also uses favourability ratings and it is here that you see the appalling choice of Simon Bridges as leader laid bare.
As you can clearly see Simon Bridges is not popular. His party is scoring highly in spite of his appalling favourables. National can not and will not win with a leader whose net favouability score is -37 compared with Jacinda’s +35. That is a massive 72 point gap. For perspective, that gap is larger than the one between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn.
A score like that and the propensity of major parties to lose support during a campaign will see at least National 9 MPs looking for a new job the morning after the election.
This would result in a slim one-seat majority however.
National would not have a viable path to power, as even with ACT’s projected two seats and NZ First’s 10 it would only reach 59 seats, two below the 61 needed. The Green Party has indicated it is unlikely to ever work with National.
Labour’s easier ride would be complicated if another party were to enter Parliament, however.
If the Maori Party were to win a single seat and re-enter Parliament it would upset the maths to the point where Labour would not be able to govern with either the Greens or NZ First alone.
Stuff
It will be interesting to see what the 1News poll result looks like, they are due shortly as they were polling over the weekend. If National remains high in that poll then Simon Bridges will cling to that result like Michael Jackson to a small boy.
National’s caucus and indeed media should ask Bridges to prove his claims that National’s internal polling is different from this poll. An unwillingness to share would be reveal the lie. Bridges knows that his own internal polling shows he is deeply unpopular, even amongst National supporters.
There will be nine or more MPs looking at this result and thinking that while Simon Bridges is the leader their jobs are at a very real risk of disappearing. The only question remaining is will they act or continue to behave like Pavlov’s dogs?
