Major Parties Slip – Can Winston Make His Run?

Major Parties Slip – Can Winston Make His Run?

electionresults.co.nz

Wellington – The latest poll has indicated voters may be drifting from the two major parties to the minor players as New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters says the country desperately needs his party’s policies.

The TVNZ/Colmar Brunton poll put National down two points from last week, but still at 54 percent support. Labour also dropped two points to 28 percent.

New Zealand First and Peters at 2.9 percent in the polls, whereas iPredict traders believe he will get around 4 percent.

Speaking on iPredict Election 2011 broadcast on Stratos Television, Peters said his party had been blacklisted by most media, despite winning more votes in 2008 than four parties that made it back into Parliament.

Peters said there was always those that were opposed to him because they were at the beck and call of corporate and foreign interests.

New Zealand was facing dire problems due to a lack of savings and failure to keep assets in local ownership, all policies NZ First backed.

He cited the failure of his referendum on compulsory savings as a major turning point that would have made a big difference in the current economic conditions.

``We have got blood, sweat and tears ahead of us,’’ Peters said.

Scoop Editor Selwyn Manning questioned whether NZ First’s stance that it could not work with other parties would appeal to voters as they wanted to back parties that could achieve things.

Peters said he was campaigning to be a strong opposition party because he could not work with parties that supported separatism, but this would not make him politically impotent.

In the past from opposition NZ First had helped set up the Cullen Fund, KiwiSaver and the foreshore and seabed legislation.

In Parliament again he would be able to negotiate to get similar policies that were part of the NZ First manifesto

``I am seriously experienced and I am not soft. ’’

The TVNZ poll also put the Greens unchanged on 9 percent with the other minor parties edging up slightly.

Apart from NZ First’s 2.9 percent, the Maori Party were on 2.1, ACT 1.5, United Future 0.8 and Mana 0.2 percent. Colin Craig's Conservative Party featured in this poll series for the first time on 0.5 percent. and the Mana Party hardly features at all on 0.2%.

It is notable that last week TVNZ’s political editor Guyon Espiner expressed disbelief that National could be on 56 percent support and iPredict traders still rate National at below 50 percent

Labour has slipped after dropping support in two successive polls to below 30 percent on iPredict.

Another interesting aspect to TVNZ's poll story was that it was the fourth or fifth item in the bulletin. Usually broadcasters highlight them because they are expensive to produce.

It could indicate that today was just a strong news day for non-political stories or it may suggest that TVNZ's news editors sense a lack of interest in the election and do not want drive away viewers.

Link to video of the full programme here

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