Christopher Luxon’s continued bad numbers mean the National Party is now seriously talking about replacing him as leader. Sources inside caucus say that Luxon has three months to turn around his numbers, connect with the public and save his career.
Otherwise he will be replaced because he is failing to do the single most important thing any National MP cares about: saving their own skin.
This challenge looks difficult for Luxon to overcome.
He has proven he is a third grader wanting to play for the All Blacks and more time will not turn him into a talented politician. Women don’t like him. People who believe in anything don’t like him because nobody knows what he believes, and free marketers can go with ACT while nationalists can go with New Zealand First – both parties known for believing in things.
Like most National leaders, no one could ever accuse Luxon of having convictions or believing in anything other than he should be running things.
Expect the opposition to start hunting the wounded Luxon and hammering him on just about everything they can, because they can sense his weakness.
The media is, of course, included in the opposition, and they will start putting him under pressure, too, as they can definitely smell blood in the water. This will keep his numbers down and make his survival even more difficult.
Luxon needs to stop playing pocket billiards, to start standing for something like leaving the ruinous Paris Climate Accord or getting rid of Treaty Principles and to stop pandering to the reality-phobes who believe a bloke can turn himself into a woman by simply declaring it to be so.
He won’t do any of that: instead he will continue to pander to the liberal elite, send all his MPs to irrelevant things like pride parades and completely fail to deliver any red meat to the right-wing voters.
