Well, that seals it. The supposedly more National sympathetic One News-Colmar Brunton poll has tonight delivered Simon Bridges’ National Party a worst result than the Newshub-Reid Research three days agoi.
On tonight’s numbers Labour sits at an “unprecedented” 59 percent, while National has slumped 17 percent to 29 percent. Anything in this ballpark - indeed anything other than numbers that made Newhub’s poll look like a rogue - would have doomed Bridges. But National’s number starting with a two makes the demise as certain as a sunrise. Or, sunset.
Bridges has survived as long as he has - 27 months - for two reasons. First, because he kept the party vote high and so nobody’s jobs were at risk because of his unpopularity. Second, because no-one else wanted the job. The polls this week removed the first reason, starting with a tumble to just 30.6 percent in the Newshub poll. Now that Todd Muller has decided to move - seemingly with the support of Nikki Kaye - the second reason has gone too.
It’s interesting to note reports today of how much Muller has spent on travel in the past month. It suggests this isn’t a spontaneous move, but rather one done with calculation and preparation. He has had a productive lockdown; while most of us were awaiting level two to be able to go get a coffee, Muller seems to have been been waiting for a level two coup. Now it’s just a matter of bringing the caucus together to count how much Bridges will lose by.
None of this is a surprise. As I’ve written more than once, Simon Bridges was never going to be the National Party’s next Prime Minister. Not without a miracle. And in truth, the miracle has gone the way of Labour, with Covid-19 delivering it a rare political opportunity slap bang in an election year. You’d have to be, well, Donald Trump to blow that.
Bridges must feel like some kind of modern day Kiwi pharaoh. Instead of frogs, hail and locusts, Bridges got Judith Collins, slushies and Jami-Lee Ross. He’s one of those leaders who never seemed to get a break., up against another leader with a far better connection to the people and a determined ‘direction of travel’.
As those minor plagues came and went, I never understood why he didn’t do something to define his party as the party of Simon Bridges. Was it lack of confidence? Lack of support? Lack of ideas? But he never took the party by the scruff of the neck with a couple of his own big ideas. Instead, he endlessly referred back to the previous term and the days of John and Bill. It was an uninspired approach; a conservative approach to conservatism.
Then came pestilence. Bridges had been a successful scrapper for two years, protecting the National brand. Two months ago he was on track to run through to the election and have his crack at a campaign and some hail mary upset win. He would have got the same chance Phil Goff had under Labour; a long shot campaign against a popular first-term PM based on being the best of a mediocre bunch in the midst of a transition. (Like Goff, he becomes just the fourth leader of his party never to have been Prime Minister. Unless he performs some Bill English-like comeback in years to come).
Instead, Bridges’ political hopes and ambitions are victims of this unforgiving virus. At first, he didn’t seem to do too badly reacting to the world-changing sickness. He was mostly supportive of the government, locked down the politics and got on with running the watchdog committee. Then came his poorly timed Facebook post, which was probably his greatest Covid misstep. And to be honest in and of itself it was hardly a massive error.
But politics is a competition. A game of comparisons. And he looked un-Prime Ministerial at a time when the person he is compared with looks about a full-on Prime Ministerial as a Prime Minister can look on Prime Minister’s Day. Ardern adapted fast; Bridges did not.
Bridges has also suffered for failing to have built up political immunity in the time he had. His failure to make his mark on the party and his failure to come up with the sort of character or issues that connected with voters was the equivalent of not getting vaccinated. He was high risk when it came to “events, dear boy, events”.
Let’s not forget, his personal popularity has always been low. It’s not like it’s dipped with this crisis; he just never connected. What’s changed is the party vote and that’s largely because voters tend not to want to change horses mid-stream of a crisis. Further, Labour has looked competent and world class, in stark contrast to its bleak years of muddled malarkey and in-fighting whilst in Opposition. It seems voters are coming out of lockdown into a mild winter and with a sense of relief and thought ‘well, this lot’s doing pretty darned well’. That was under-lined by last week’s Budget, as I wrote.
Yes, that mood will change once the wage subsidy comes off and companies who have been treading water begin to sink. But National can’t wait for that. Even then, unless we see new clusters and infection spikes that suggest we endured these past two months for nowt, people will still be inclined to lean on a competent incumbent.
So they will turn to the next two cabs off the rank - Muller and Kaye. It’s earlier than expected, and Muller must feel confident that expectations for this year’s election are so low he can take the loss and still get another crack. There must be some risk in that; if Ardern’s popularity holds and National can’t get back to at least near 40, then he could yet face questions by Christmas. Judith Collins hasn’t gone anywhere, remember.
But for National Muller and Kaye tick a lot of boxes. They keep the party in the centre and attune to the real politik, cover the rural/urban divide, and bring a sense of freshness. Bridges has, unfairly or not, gone stale in the public mind.
So now the former Waikato University student president - which is where I first met and reported on him - who went to work in Jim Bolger’s office, did the requisite corporate years and then worked his way up the MP rankings, is just waiting for the final count. Down Bridges goes, swamped by a sea of bad polls and lack of public support, much like Pharaoh.
Tomorrow, Todd will be on top and a new round of introductions will begin. But the virus remains. Ardern will still say these are matters for that party. Winston Peters will still look to mock the Opposition for sport. Muller arrives with few political levers to pull; it’ll be fascinating to see where he tries to take the party in the four months he has until election day.
lowest since 2003