Election 2026

With election day tomorrow, how would you rate the campaign?

It feels to me like we’ve been in campaign mode for the whole year. I couldn’t even bring myself to watch TV1's People’s Debate last night all the way through to the end.

Elections are never an overly positive affair, but this campaign has been pretty awful.

So much so, that I reckon a lot of people will have forgotten a lot of the policies that have been trotted out.

And I’m not the only one thinking it’s been a bit of a cluster.

Some of the political leaders don’t think it’s been all that great, either.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins says National has run the most negative campaign of any first-term Government. And the results of a new study would suggest he’s right on that.

The Internet, Social Media and Politics Research Lab at Victoria University has done some analysis and has found that 65 percent of National’s Facebook posts have been negative.

A lot of that will have come from the relentless online attacks the party has made on Greens co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick.

It’s been so relentless, that Swarbrick herself has said that she’s effectively being cyber-bullied by National.

I agree with her. Bearing in mind too that it was only a few weeks ago when National’s Selwyn MP Nicola Grigg went public with some of the online bullying she’s been dealing with.

Since then, National has continued having a go at Chlöe online. Using unflattering photos, all of that. Just really nasty stuff.

Not that Labour has been squeaky clean, either.

Because the study which has found that 65 percent of National’s Facebook posts have been negative also found that just over 50 percent of Labour’s posts have been negative too.

So Chris Hipkins may be right when he says it’s been the most negative campaign ever by a first-term Government. But there’s a bit of the old pot calling the kettle going on.

Then we get to how Winston Peters feels the campaign has gone.

The NZ First leader thinks it’s the worst one he’s ever seen. He’s seen a few and is describing this one as a circus. Criticising the party leaders who have been clamouring to the gelato shop in Christchurch to try the gelato flavour named after them.

He’s been saying: “It's just astonishing what's happened here. It's turned into, sadly, a circus. This idea of having an ice cream poll and every leader dutifully turning up, subservient as it is, to such an unscientific, unprofessional thing is beyond me.”

He goes on: “And then you've got people petting dogs. I love dogs, but you know, going around petting dogs can be very dangerous sometimes, you pat the wrong dog.

“They’re talking about a cost of living crisis, and they’re flipping hamburgers.”

He’s talking there about Christopher Luxon and David Seymour who have both been filmed in the past week making burgers.

I don’t get too upset about that kind of thing. It’s just politicians being politicians.

But I do think that it’s a campaign we’ll all be pleased to see the end of. For me, it’s been too long and too negative, with too many debates.

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Well, the polls close at 7pm tomorrow, fat orange pens notwithstanding, and the votes will be counted. By the time I'm back here on Monday, we should have a fair idea of what the government for the next three years could look like. Notice I have used a conditional sentence: should, could, because really, who would know if you look at the polls? 

It's been a funny old election. At least it'll be interesting – the electorate battles, there are many of those that are going to be fascinating. I will be glued to ZB throughout the evening. This is one of the times when you think, oh, wish I could be working on Election Night. It's great being part of the team that brings you results. But the next best thing is being able to hear the fruits of everybody's hard work, so I'll be listening to ZB – I'll find that more interesting than the television coverage. 

And there were so many undecided voters, myself included. I think the most helpful comment came from a texter a couple of weeks ago who said, "rule out who you simply cannot vote for and tick the box for who's left", which is advice I've heard before, but that text came at a time when I needed to hear it. Are you still undecided? I think I'm clear now, pretty clear now. 

Are you still undecided? Have you changed your mind over the course of the election campaign? And when it comes to the election campaigns, who in your mind ran the best one? As far as I'm concerned, National and Labour ran terrible campaigns, absolutely awful. Boring, repetitive, uninspiring, negative, nasty. 

Losing Chris Bishop as campaign manager as punishment – never have the lines "this is going to hurt you more than it's going to hurt me" or "this is going to hurt me more than it's going to hurt you", never have they rung more true, as you dump Chris Bishop as campaign manager for being involved in the attempted coup. And that's cost National. I don't think Simeon Brown will be getting another call up. The National campaign was so bad that Harry Mowbray and Don Brash decided to put down the lattes and take over the campaign. And then core voting messages were a distraction. Split voting: no, yes, no, yes. To convince voters you're a strong and stable party, surely you need your supporters to be harmonising and singing from the same song sheet. So no, absolutely dreadful. 

Their coalition partner hasn't helped them either. ACT's been very sensible, they've learnt their lesson from the last campaign, but ew, Michael Laws, ew. But then Labour's coalition partners haven't helped them either. The Greens and Te Pāti Māori might have policies that their voters support and that they believe in and that they think will reduce the impact of gangs and the misery they wreak by engaging with the gangs. But good solid swing voters get mightily spooked by soft on gangs policies and Chris Hipkins had to come out all puffed of chest and steely of jaw to try and right the ship. 

No, the minor parties have run relatively good campaigns: ACT, the Greens, Opportunity, they've stuck solidly to their guns. They probably will get over, just. But for if you're a centre swing voter, it's been pretty uninspiring. 

When it comes to voting, are you pretty clear? Have you been clear all the way through? What was the pivotal moment of the campaign for you, or was it simply taking the advice of my texter: ruling out the parties you simply cannot, cannot bring yourself to vote for and ticking the box for what's left? 

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This week's Politics Friday Election Special focused on the Christchurch East electorate.

The candidates, National's Alexandra Davids and Labour's Reuben Davidson, made their pitch to become the next local MP.

They discussed their backgrounds before entering politics and outlined how they would tackle the key issues facing the electorate, including homelessness, economic development, and the amount of vape shops around schools.

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A political commentator is struggling to predict the outcome of the election. 

Election Day is tomorrow, and thousands of votes have already been cast. 

Polls released throughout the campaign have fluctuated, no party showing a clear lead across all of the polls. 

Brigitte Morten told Ryan Bridge the election is all over the place. 

She says something that's also different now is it's not just a red-blue race, we're talking about individual electorate seats having a massive impact. 

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At the end of each week, Mike Hosking takes you through the big-ticket items and lets you know what he makes of it all. 

 

Labour's campaign: 6/10 

The gangs hurt them, but Hipkins was short, sharp, on message, and by-and-large didn’t put himself in danger. 

 

National's campaign: 6/10 

Spent too much energy pretending Chlöe is a Finance Minister and trying to scare people. When you have a record, defend it. 

 

NZ First's campaign: 5/10 

Too negative, relied too heavily on town halls in a 'I haven't got any new ideas' sort of way. The leader looked old and Michael Laws didn’t help. 

 

The Green's campaign: 5/10 

Chlöe was better than Marama, who's understanding of yields and bond rates should worry us all. Not enough environment and too much envy of success, but the message was clear, even if you didn’t like it, and the polls have helped. 

 

ACT's campaign: 8/10 

Easily the best of the lot. Disciplined, simple, clear, busy, used social well, restrained, almost adult, stayed away from the dirt, and Paul Henry was the stroke of genius no one else thought of. 

 

Opportunity's campaign: 5/10 

Peaked too early and got exposed when the land tax and universal wage turned out not to be a thing and bottom trawling did. Qiulae Wong could have been generated by AI. It's a marketing exercise you would want to refine for next time. 

 

The Māori Party's campaign: Who would know

LISTEN ABOVE FOR MIKE HOSKING'S FULL WEEK IN REVIEW. 

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Fun fact time – it turns out we really aren't into elections all that much. 

The average turnout since 1982 has been 78%. Last election it was 78%. To me, that is not a great result, given over 90% of us had enrolled. 

Why do we make so much of the enrolment process when we know the chances of those people turning out is next to zero? 

And what happens to all those people who do enrol but don't vote? It's not like they don't have the time, a place, or an opportunity. 

Early voting has become a thing. Once upon a time it was a sign, normally, of a rush, an energy to oust an incumbent. Nowadays it's about making it easy, and you do it while you're shopping. 

They say this year voting is well ahead of last time. What does that mean? Nothing. Because the real test will be how many ultimately turn out at all. And if the number is as per usual, my bet is all bets are off. 

Why? 

Because the polls that show it's a tight race may not apply, because many of the people who answered a poll might not vote. 

"Telling" and "doing" are clearly two different things. Motivation is your key. 

That's why historically conservative and older voters are to be trusted more on turnout. The younger you are, the less likely you are to enrol and/or vote. You can answer a poll and tell us your problem, but it doesn't mean you will do anything about it. 

In the 1980s and 1990s turnout was always in the mid-80's. By the turn of the century, it's in the 70s. The exception is 2020, because of Covid. 

We are less interested in democracy. 

In 2011 turnout was 74%, the lowest since the 1880's. We should be ashamed of ourselves. 

It is why the Greens don't vote as well as they poll. 

My sense is that in 2026 turnout will be low. There has been a lack of energy, a lack of fizz, a lack of spark. 

You either want the current lot, or you don't. 

The policies are worth little, if anything. 

There have been no firebrand issues. The candidates are vanilla. These are not historic times. 

A low turnout favours the incumbents. 

What you think might happen and what does happen, as history shows, could well be two entirely different things. 

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The week has come to an end, which means Kate Hawkesby and Tim Wilson are back with Mike Hosking to Wrap the Week that Was. 

Campaigning is coming to a close tonight as the Election has finally arrived. With the polls closing tomorrow night, what are their predictions? 

And the complaints about the pens providing in the polling booths continue. 

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Associate Health Minister Casey Costello says she's very pleased "challenging" negotiations with Hato Hone St John have been finalised this week, as she faces questions around the timing of a major funding announcement. 

On Thursday, the Government announced the ambulance service would get an extra $258 million over four years, paying for more than 220 additional staff including ambulance officers and call handlers, as well as technology upgrades. 

Asked how the timing of that announcement dovetailed with election rules, the NZ First MP told Mike Hosking Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora's negotiations with St John had taken many months, and she was pleased they had gotten over the line. 

Wellington Free Ambulance was also close to an agreement, she said. 

Costello's office has previously said she was only notified about the Health NZ decision on November 2nd. 

Costello is standing in her home electorate of Port Waikato, which is a "very strong National seat", she told Hosking. 

"I'm running a two-tick campaign, but it is a historically, I mean this is Bill Birch's seat, so you can imagine it being a blue seat." 

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Officials expect to have a preliminary election result tomorrow night, but we could be waiting a while before we know the shape of the next government. 

Voting places around the country will close tomorrow at 7pm. 

Latest polling —released this morning by The Post and Freshwater Strategy— shows Opportunity is still in the kingmaker position, but is polling only just above the 5% threshold. 

Electoral Commission Chief Executive Karl Le Quesne told Mike Hosking "preliminary results" will be published late tomorrow night, probably after 11pm. 

He says people need to remember those will only be preliminary results, and they still need to do processing and integrity checks afterwards. 

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Here's an election prediction for you.  

Look out. Incoming. Hot take. Reckons. Newsflash. 

More New Zealanders will watch sport this weekend than follow the election.  

I was chatting to a mate yesterday, not political, not engaged, plans to vote but doesn't care too much.  

He's been watching Netflix and listening to podcasts. Wouldn't know who Michael Laws is. Wouldn't know who Qiulae Wong is.  

He's no idiot. He knows his principles and loosely who they align with.  

But for many New Zealanders, most Kiwis, elections are just noise. 

Like Cicadas or an air conditioner unit... humming away. 

News reporters working themselves in a lather. Breathless stories being 'broken'. 

To the relief of many of you listening or watching this morning, this weekend we have the football derby, India will ship the Black Caps, there's the League World Cup semis on Saturday night, and on Sunday morning, all eyes on Murrayfield for the All Blacks v Scotland.  

By the way, the weather is looking quite warm, the beach appealing, the BBQ good to go.  

Sport will be the main course, with perhaps a side of election coverage. 

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