Nats, Act lead way but left catching up

National and Act could form a government based on the latest Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll.

Labour and the Greens have closed the gap with the political right, but only just.

National was on 38 per cent, down one point on last month’s poll, while Act was on 10 per cent, up one point.

The result would give the right 62 seats, enough to form a government.

Labour was on 35 per cent, up one point, while the Greens were on 8 per cent, up one point. This would give those parties 56 seats.

Te Pati Ma¯ori was steady on 2 per cent and NZ First continues a string of good polls, hitting 4 per cent, up two points.

It has been a busy week for polling, with Sunday night’s release ofa Newshub-Reid Research Poll showing Labour on just 32.3 and National on 40.7.

Another poll was published this week — a leaked corporate poll from Talbot Mills, although it had an earlier polling period.

That 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 was on 4 per cent while Te Pati Ma¯ori was on 2.2 per cent.

Labour’s slight bounce in the party vote is mirrored in the preferred Prime Minister poll.

Labour leader Jacinda Ardern hit 35 per cent, up two points, while National’s Christopher Luxon fell two points to 23 per cent.

Act leader David Seymour polled 6 per cent, down one point.

Ardern’s net favourability was up one point to 8 per cent, while Christopher Luxon’s fell four to -3 per cent.

A -17 per cent of people think the country is on the wrong track — the ninth month in a row that metric has been negative.

However, -17 is an improvement on the -28 who believed the country was on the wrong track last month.

The cost of living remains the most important voting issue on 23 per cent, with housing and the economy following behind on 11 per cent and 10 per cent respectively.

The poll was taken from November 3-8 with 1000 respondents.

The margin of error is 3.1 per cent at the 95 per cent confidence interval.