Latest Colmar Brunton poll – people disapprove of Judith

Written By: - Date published: 7:35 am, May 28th, 2021 - 44 comments
Categories: Christopher Luxon, greens, jacinda ardern, john key, Judith Collins, labour, national, polls, Simon Bridges, todd muller - Tags:

The latest Colmar Brunton poll was released last night.  Labour is down 3% to 46% which is not bad given they had just given significant increases to benefits in the budget.  I suspect the public sector partial wage freeze did the damage.

National is up 2% to 29%.  Act is up 1% and the Greens are down 1%.  This is all within margin of error stuff.

In the preferred Prime Minister ranking Jacinda Ardern is up 5% to 48% which is stratospheric.

Judith Collins is up 1% to 9%.  Her contenders Chris Luxon is on 3% and Simon Bridges is on 2%.  John Key is still getting a 1% nostalgia vote.

Other notables were David Seymour who recorded 6% as preferred leader and Chloe Swarbrick made a surprise appearance gaining 2% support.

The ranking of performance provided the most interesting result.  From One News:

Despite National’s 2% rise – its leader did not see the support reflected in approval ratings.

Collins’ approval rating has plunged to -19, by far the worst result the National Party has received.

Approval ratings are calculated by the amount of people who approve of Collins’ performance as National leader, minus the amount of people who disapprove.

Thirty per cent of people approved of the way Collins was handling her job as leader of the National Party, while 49% disapproved – giving her an approval rating of -19.

Twenty per cent of people either did not know if they approved or disapproved or refused to answer.

Collins’ rating of -19 was a sharp fall from the December 2020 poll, where she sat at +9. This is the first time Collins’ approval rating has been negative.

In October 2020 she was at +6, in September she was at +12 and in July after becoming leader she was at +27.

In comparison, Todd Muller received +10 in June and Simon Bridges was on -40 in May.

I guess Judith can say that her result is better than Bridges’ worst result.  But National must be scratching its head wondering what does it do about Judith.

44 comments on “Latest Colmar Brunton poll – people disapprove of Judith ”

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  1. Incognito 1
    28 May 2021 at 7:53 am

    The Tories have a Clown, National has a Joker, Labour has a Trump.

  2. Gosman 2
    28 May 2021 at 7:56 am

    ACT nicely consolidating it's support despite Natonal rising in the polls. It looks like those claiming ACT is only cannibalising National support are wrong.

    • Barfly 2.1
      28 May 2021 at 8:44 am

      Heh – That's pretty much margin of error stuff there Gosman….but kudos for persistence

      • Patricia Bremner 2.1.1
        28 May 2021 at 10:54 am

        +1 Barfly.

        I was surprised there was not a larger kick back against the pay restrictions, but perhaps most Labour/Green people know that helping those struggling benefits all.

    • Muttonbird 2.2
      28 May 2021 at 8:46 am

      Clearly ACT only takes support from National, nothing is more true.

      Combined they are at 38% in this poll. Bless them.

      • Gosman 2.2.1
        28 May 2021 at 10:47 am

        Clearly that is not the case because BOTH parties rose in the poll. If ACT was only taking support from National then National would likely be falling.

        • ghostwhowalksnz 2.2.1.1
          28 May 2021 at 11:09 am

          1 and 2% is not a rise or fall, its the statistical noise that these things should have.

          Indeed its spot on for their relative shares of 100% as 1% noise for ACT is the same level as 2% noise for national and 3% noise for labour.

        • Tricledrown 2.2.1.2
          28 May 2021 at 3:21 pm

          Gosman ACT are there because of taxpayer funded welfare on the coat tails of National.

          To claim ACT is getting votes from labour or the Greens is a very long stretch.ACT is going up in support because Nationals disarray and the collapse of other minor parties.

          If National get a leader who can stabilise Nationals voter base it will stop ACT cannibilizing its vote .

          ACT's scary financial recipe for our economy will keep Labour's pragmatic approach looking good.

          The dog that wags the tail scenario will put centerist voters in Labours camp. For Nattional to become more popular it will have to distance itself from ACT.

    • AB 2.3
      28 May 2021 at 9:54 am

      Short-term movements within the margin of error mean nothing. We know that ACT and the Greens do better in polls when their adjacent major party is perceived to be in poor shape. The only question of interest is the size of their base – core support that is resistant to such mood-driven switching. Successive elections suggest that the Green base is over 5%,. It's too early to say whether ACT's diehard 2% is growing – it may be, and it seems likely that the hard right in NZ is much bigger than 2%.

      • Gosman 2.3.1
        28 May 2021 at 10:50 am

        I can tell you that research indicates the core support base for ACT has doubled and is sitting comfortably higher than 2%. On top of that the number of people open to being influenced towards ACT's policies has rocketed up.

        • Tiger Mountain 2.3.1.1
          28 May 2021 at 12:50 pm

          “rocketed up”–has NZ had a rise in the number of Incels or something?

          • Tricledrown 2.3.1.1.1
            28 May 2021 at 7:59 pm

            Tiger you are right the exclusive brethren,gloriavale,and the JLR looney conspiracists ACT is their Natural home.

        • AB 2.3.1.2
          28 May 2021 at 2:06 pm

          I'm sure you have access to data I don't. It will be interesting to watch. If the more 'purist' right are convinced that National will never implement the things that are dear to their hearts, it may cause a permanent desertion to ACT. It happened to Labour, they lost their left permanently to NewLabour and now the Greens, but it took what was seen as a major betrayal over 1984-1990 for that to happen. I don't see a similar landmark event on the right.

        • CrimzonGhost 2.3.1.3
          2 June 2021 at 4:24 pm

          Core has doubled? …So What? Just means they've gained back their old core. The Lone Ranger Seymour to push his Mini-Cult forward. Act was constantly at just above or just below 5% in all previous elections until it sunk to 2% or so. Just like Greens any extra than the 5% is just due to defections from the Major parties & also because of the dying off of rival small parties.

      • CrimzonGhost 2.3.2
        2 June 2021 at 4:13 pm

        Hard Rightis only much bigger than 2% only if you consider traditionally large chunk of hard right is actually within National.

        Hard right isn't a monolith …Christian Hard right? Never more than 5% eg. CHP …Christian Democrats …Christian Coalition …Destiny/Vision but even CD/CC & later UnitedFuture/Future NZ moderated by more moderate/centrist Christians.

        Most right & centrist political CD/UF-type Christians probably now ensconced in National alongside the EB & American-type evangelical/charismatic/pentecostal types, but also probably a chunk of them in ACT too.

        Nationalist Hard Right? …Tiny, barely existent

        Out & Out Neo-Nazi/Fascist Hard Right Microscopic, even more barely existent

    • ghostwhowalksnz 2.4
      28 May 2021 at 11:19 am

      ". It looks like those claiming ACT is only cannibalising National support are wrong."

      The reality over many decades is whn National rises ACT falls … same for last election. These are not 'independents' who raised ACTs vote form 1% to 7% as the Nats went down the toilet.

      Look at the polling as one yellow line rises, another blue line falls,

  3. JeffB 3
    28 May 2021 at 8:02 am

    Judith's “Orewa” moment has been a flop. Brash returned a 17% jump in the polls and Judith and Seymour have gained only 3% between them. This suggests the group prepared to change their vote because they are opposed to beneficiaries and or targeted Maori policies is very small in Aotearoa 2021.

  4. Foreign Waka 4
    28 May 2021 at 8:31 am

    Those polls are useless. Asking 1000 people and if you choose a certain demographic its skewered. But I agree with David Seymour getting more traction. I am left leaning and more of a Social Democrat (not sure whether this government actually know what it means) but with all the race talk and trying to social engineer kids at school whether its gender or race is in my book just so wrong. The manipulation of opinions driven by "clicks" and "likes" will end up in tears for the next generation.

    • Marcus Morris 4.1
      28 May 2021 at 10:22 pm

      How can you equate the teaching of and learning of our history with social engineering is beyond belief. When I was at secondary school in the fifties the standard text for the study of New Zealand's post European history was a very thin little book called "Our Country". The Treaty of Waitangi was barely mentioned and we were taught about the Maori Wars when the Maori people got their just rewards for treasonous behaviour. No mention of Chief Justice Prendergast, whose attitude to the Maori people probably set the tone for race relations and white supremacy for decades if not the next century.

      • mac1 4.1.1
        28 May 2021 at 10:55 pm

        It's called 'social engineering' when people don't agree with the content of the teaching, and 'proper education' when they do.

        I was a school teacher. My business was social engineering. Some people formed roads. I formed people. From form 3-7!

        I did such a good job of training that a former student, now a publican, shouted me a pint of Baltic Porter tonight.

        • Marcus Morris 4.1.1.1
          29 May 2021 at 8:08 am

          I too was a teacher for over forty years. Perhaps because I taught mathematics throughout that time I never thought of it in terms of social engineering. I like to think that I did my best in the subject for my students and I tried to treat them all with fairness and dignity. I never wittingly showed any gender or racial bias. Was this social engineering. I have to add that, having spent most of my teaching career in conservative rural areas, I was very careful to show no political bias.

          • mac1 4.1.1.1.1
            29 May 2021 at 10:27 am

            Every teacher who insisted on rules of behaviour, who taught children to consider others, who checked bullying and putdown behaviour, who showed the wonders of art, literature, science, mathematics, music, who taught the history of the foibles and achievements of humanity, who taught sport or health and how to negotiate decisions in relationships, etc etc taught social engineering, IMO.

            We called it 'socialisation'. Mrs Mac1 argues that engineering means to construct a path along which students are steered but we steered them along paths where social constraints were taught to avoid criminality, harm, and instead to exercise self control, kindness, concern for others.

            Scouts did this. Churches did this. Sports teams did this. The police woman who taught us to cross the road safely did this.

            Parents did this. Our family did this. Society did this social engineering and society paid us teachers to do this to fledgling humans for some dozen formative years.

            We are all social constructs. An article in today's Press examines a novel (since 2012) criminal court sitting that works on the principle that according to the presiding judge every criminal can be redeemed, it's a question of the cost of redemption. Social engineering?

            • Marcus Morris 4.1.1.1.1.1
              29 May 2021 at 2:48 pm

              I would disagree with nothing you have said but that is not what Foreign Waka meant by "social engineering" in my opinion. In the context of his comment I see it as having a "subversive" connotation.

              • mac1 …
                29 May 2021 at 3:20 pm

                Foreign waka did not appreciate race or gender being subjects at school and sees that teaching as subversive.That is why I commented that what is at stake here is what is considered now to be 'proper education' or 'socialisation' is seen by others as subversive and wrong. Education has become more liberal and inclusive.

                I don't like the term 'social engineering' as it has connotations of manipulation, state power, and practice that is secretive and at best dodgy, if not criminal, because in certain usages that is what it means.

                It's one of my trigger words-like 'PC". I see this sort of stuff as sloganism by conservatives.

  5. Ad 5
    28 May 2021 at 9:31 am

    Greens holding ok despite not a mote of political oxygen available to them through Budget.

  6. Enough is Enough 6
    28 May 2021 at 9:39 am

    But National must be scratching its head wondering what does it do about Judith

    Far be it from me to advise the Tories, but if I was in their caucus I would leave Judith exactly where she is.

    The National Party is not winning the next election. That is as close to certain as you can get. So if you don't want your name tainted with losing, then I would stay well clear of leading in 2023.

    Also because they are as low as they will go, they won't have nervous bank benchers like last year when half the caucus was looking at losing their jobs. When that happens, MPs panic and change leaders in the hope it will save them their seats.

    Bridges is to dumb for any of that though so I expect him to have another crack

    • Muttonbird 6.1
      28 May 2021 at 9:42 am

      Always with the personal ambition over public service with the Tories.

      • Drowsy M. Kram 6.1.1
        28 May 2021 at 10:04 am

        Seems so, although I wouldn't rule out an ethos of service to wealthy minorities.

        • Macro 6.1.1.1
          28 May 2021 at 10:59 am

          Well what's good for me, must be good for my mates! ergo the whole country! devil

  7. mac1 7
    28 May 2021 at 10:52 am

    For me the interesting issue about how NZers reacted in the polls to the Budget was the media's reaction.
    They asked why no bounce in thepolls after the Budget.
    For so long we have seen Budgets as a way of buying votes as a primary purpose.

    In 2021 we have a Budget that is aimed at reducing poverty amongst beneficiaries. All of the derogatory 'bene bashing' and the blaming of the poor for their own misfortune defied. All the racist rhetoric denied. All the doom sayers challenged.

    And the electorate stays within or close to the bounds of statistical margins of error.

    National is left hoping that the end of their slump is nigh but their get out of jail cards are played. They need more than to shuffle their cards. They need a new deck.

    • Anne 7.1
      29 May 2021 at 11:09 pm

      They asked why no bounce in the polls after the Budget.

      The media know that reactions to budgets, government policy decisions etc. take an average of 6 weeks to two months to filter through to the public. Its been that way for decades. Half the population probably have no idea what was in the budget except some vague recollection that people on benefits got a rise.

      They are being disingenuous.

  8. Robert Guyton 8
    28 May 2021 at 11:19 am

    I think Judith's role is to be relentlessly corrosive to Jacinda. Judith does not, can not, expect to become Prime Minister, but will, for the sake of the kudos she'll earn from her "behind the scenes" people, do what's required, if she's able, to erode public confidence in Jacinda. I expect this behaviour will escalate and become intense as the next election draws near. Seymour is simply Judith's little helper, able to excite the voters who regard Judith as lacking the killer instinct.

    • Drowsy M. Kram 8.1
      28 May 2021 at 11:32 am

      I think Judith's role is to be relentlessly corrosive to Jacinda.

      And if Collins goes too far, there's always the 'eyebrows defense' – like a game of chess!

      I’m enjoying reruns of the UK TV series “House of Cards” and the two two sequels (‘To Play the King‘ and ‘The Final Cut‘); they’re “Yes Prime Minister” with lots of bite.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Cards_(British_TV_series)

  9. coreyjhumm 9
    28 May 2021 at 3:17 pm

    Hilarious. Nationals best chance to get in government in 2023 was Nikki Kay, whoever stupidly involved her in that leadership coup destroyed National till maybe 2029. Nikki Kaye may be hated by labour activists but she wasnt hated by the public, she was liberal blue green who could honestly say "I know I can beat Jacinda , I did it twice and made her change electorates) she stole a safe labour seat, and her battle with cancer endeared her to a lot of people even my staunch labour mum, I could see her running on a blue green platform and offering more concessions to the greens than labour would cos the tories have no ideology, other than power and making any deal to get it. She might not have won but her brand of compassionated green liberal toryism wouldnt have been super unpopular.

    I reckon they'll stick around with Judith for wee while longer because they have noone else and Simon is even more hated than Judith. National has to win back the regions and the cities, if anyone think Luxton who is openly prefered by china (remember that video with John key and Luxton being called cute so cringe ) closed down regional flight routes and regional banks is the guy to get the regions back or the cities they need to get out of the beltway lost all of their talent last election through resignations and retirements and scandals. Ironically , Paula would have done a better job as Nationals furniture saver than Judith, I hate Paula but people love her in the middle for all the reasons I don't like her.

    Bridges and nicola Willis maybe? They are too beltway but I reckon they'd be a better bet than all the ones on offer.

    However I reckon they'll stick with Judith for a while… All around the world working class people are abandoning center left parties over culture war woke stuff so I think the nats will try this for all it's worth with the hate speech legislation coming up all hell could break loose, but I doubt it cos the nats don't have the brains to play a culture war as they are neoliberal to their bones and won't stray too far from that ideology and that's why I generally think nz f and act will be the benefactors of any culture war.

    Nationals only chance is if covid gets back in due to a travel bubble and slow vax roll out and if that happens it won't matter that national was extremely in favor of travel bubbles it'll just be labours fault to the public.

    But unless covid comes back nats will be rebuilding for the next six years

  10. Stuart Munro 10
    28 May 2021 at 7:12 pm

    There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. Act IV scene III

    Key stole Judith's like he stole everything else in his life, and it's far from clear Judith could have beaten Jacinda were she in her prime. But her party is full of dog tucker, and she will carry the blame for the polling of a generation of feckless and undisciplined rabble, who have not made themselves electable.

    "Every battle is won or lost before it's ever fought". Sun Tzu

    And National are poised to lose many more to come, until they refresh their ranks, develop tenable policy, and bite their tongues when they have no valid critique. Don't hold your breath for those developments.

    • peter sim 10.1
      28 May 2021 at 8:49 pm

      You are so correct (I nearly wrote "right"). The natz were born out of desperation When Labour swept into power in the 1930s. It was a coalition of farmer ("backbone of the country") and "townie" capitalists who despised Labour. This was after some 60 to 90 years of british colonial influence.

      The british born to rule notion has never been absent from the natz, often blatant.

      That there actually are Tiriti obligations has never dawned on them.

      Immigration changes have altered the country's cultural mix (marriage, etc makes a difference).

      The age demographic has changed considerably.

      The "freshwater" economics from Chicago was always pure bovine excreta.

      As GB Shaw said " if you laid all the economists in the world end to end they would never reach a conclusion."

      Maybe covid will wake up the wealthy greedy that sharing profits socially results in more happy customers. Shareholders do not need that much return. Executive and managerial perks should be unnecessary.

      OBTW have the natz heard of climate change?