GUEST BLOG: Ian Powell – Important lessons from UK politics for New Zealand Labour Party
Recent reputable opinion polls suggest that, contrary to both historical precedent and most people’s expectations (including mine), the chances of the National-ACT-NZ First coalition being a one-term government are now around 50:50.
This is extraordinary. The last one-term government was 50 years ago (Labour, 1972-75) although National were only just re-elected in 1978 election by a whisker.
Since proportional representation was introduced in the 1996 election, the governments have been either National or Labour led for three or two terms.
Jacinda Ardern: in February 2020 it was 50:50 over whether she would be a one term prime minister
The qualification is that at the beginning of 2020 it was looking to be about 50:50 whether Labour would lead the next government after having been elected in 2017. However, its successful handling of the Covid-19 pandemic led to its massive victory in the election later that same year.
What is unprecedented, however, is that I can’t recall the main party leading a government falling below 30% in a reputable poll after only around 15 months in office.
What we now in effect have is an unpopular government running neck-and-neck with an unpopular former government. In other words, an unpredictable, unusual and unappealing election next year.
While Labour is no doubt pleased to be in this unexpected position, caution is required. Labour’s popularity has marginally improved; National’s has significantly declined. If Labour wants to lead the next government it is going to learn a few lessons.
Understanding an electoral landslide unreflective of unpopular will
Last September Labour leader Chris Hipkins went to the United Kingdom to learn from the British Labour Party following its election victory two months earlier. The victory was misleadingly called a landslide.
I argued in an earlier Political Bytes post (24 September) that this was not smart politics:
Careful what you ask for Labour Party: following UK Labour not smart politics – Political Bytes
Although Labour had a parliamentary seats landslide winning 412 out of the 650 seats, it was not a mandate landslide. Instead it was the consequence of the quite different and unproportional ‘first-past-the-post’ electoral system
In particular:
- Labour won 64% of the seats with 34% of the vote, the smallest ever vote share for a party taking office. Polls before the election were reporting over 40% support.
- Turnout, estimated at 59%, was at its lowest since 2001 (and before that, 1885).
- Labour’s total number of votes fell to 9.7 million, down from 10.3 million in 2019.
- The Conservatives plunged from 44% to 24% while the far-right Reform UK surged from nowhere to 14% of the vote (but only four seats). The combined Conservative–Reform vote, at 38%, was bigger than Labour’s share.
- Five new independent candidates opposing the genocide in Gaza were elected, including former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn who defeated his Labour rival with a large margin.
- Labour actually lost some seats. It also had big majorities in other seats slashed, including its leader and now prime minister Keir Starmer.
Keir Starmer led Labour’s sharp turn from the left to the right
Behind British Labour’s popularity decline
A big part of the reason for Labour’s declining popular vote was its sharp turn to the right and abandoning transformational policies focussed on ‘for the many, not the few’. Many left-wing members were purged and Labour suffered a significant membership loss.
When Jeremy Corbyn was its leader in 2019 Labour’s membership was 532,000. Under Starmer’s leadership, by the end of 2023 it had fallen by a massive 30% to 370,450.
Whereas Labour was advantaged by electoral disproportionality in 2024, it was disadvantaged by it in 2019.
Rather than between two main parties of the left and the right, Starmer’s leadership led to the 2024 election to be a contest between the challenging right and the defending hard right.
I concluded my above-mentioned post by advising Chris Hipkins and the Labour Party to recognise that:
UK Labour’s parliamentary majority is not a reflection of popular will. Instead it is a reflection of an undemocratic electoral system. Hence, contrary to appearances, Labour’s majority has an inherent fragility within it.
Realisation of inherent fragility
Since British Labour’s win last July, like Christopher Luxon, the new prime minister Keir Starmer had an unusual experience. He never had a discernible post-election ‘honeymoon’ (ie, post-election poll boost).
Nigel Farage’s far right Reform party the beneficiary
Less than seven months later Reuters (4 February) reported a YouGov poll revealing in stark form how much the Labour government’s “inherent fragility” has come home to roost:
Nigel Farage’s right-wing party leads for first time in new UK poll | Reuters
Reflecting public discontent with Starmer’s government, the poll revealed that if an election were held in early February, 25% of British voters would choose Reform, 24% would pick Labour, and 21% would vote for the Conservatives.
In other words, Labour had lost about 10% from its election night result while Nigel Farage’s simplistic far right populism has reaped the benefits of this discontent. Too many saw Labour as being more for the few than the many.
It is as if Labour’s transition from the left to the right has set the foundation for a transition from a government of the right to a government of the far right and hard right.
Labour’s call to make
While recognising that the current Luxon government is less than halfway through its term (and even a week is a long time in politics), with the New Zealand Labour Party now looking to have, give or take, a 50:50 chance of leading the next government it needs to learn from this UK experience.
Can Chris Hipkins’ Labour be transitional for the many or transitional for the far right
Does it want to be transformational in a way that delivers tangibly for the many rather than the few in areas such as incomes, taxation, environment, housing, health (a mea culpa for botching up the health system when it was in government would not go astray) and education.
Or is Labour content with being a transition from the current hard right government to one led by the far right?
Labour is not in my view a left-wing party. Instead it is a social liberal technocratic party cloaked in elitism. Social liberal values are good but not enough (economic justices is even more determinative than social justice).
If Labour genuinely wants to be tangibly transformative for the many rather than just the few, it must go beyond social liberalism, see through a wider lens than technocratic, and get rid of its elitism.
Ian Powell was Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, the professional union representing senior doctors and dentists in New Zealand, for over 30 years, until December 2019. He is now a health systems, labour market, and political commentator living in the small river estuary community of Otaihanga (the place by the tide). First published at Political Bytes
The UK isn’t seeing politics as normal: It’s a ticking time bomb ever since the Southport incident.
Starmer resorted form and used the courts to suppress widespread anger over immigration and Muslims in particular. Having no solution, just like his Tory predecessors, he locked people up for even nonviolent dissent. An angry post on X and there’s half a dozen cops on your doorstep to “check your thinking”.
It won’t end well. The land of my birth is heading for some kind of civil war. He doesn’t have the support of the people and us unlikely to last his full term. To avoid bloodshed, he should call an early election, thus lancing the boil to some extent.
In the real world the UK has always been and will continue to always be a multi-cultural melting pot with large migrant populations and high levels of immigration. Historically, and for the most part the UK has a long history and an exceptionally healthy and positive experience with migration and I believe that will also continue.
The prospect of a Reform government is very real but I don’t think the brits will resort to mass deportations or large cutbacks to immigration because the different cultural communities and blending of cultures is such a normal part of their society and heritage.
Labour is not in my view a left-wing party. Instead it is a social liberal technocratic party cloaked in elitism. Social liberal values are good but not enough (economic justices is even more determinative than social justice).
Ian I agree with you here .
Labour is not the blue collar workers party any more .
The Greens have taken that space.
A bit late to the party. I’m not convinced that the Greens are a blue collar party. Their support seems to come from two spheres, younger voters with environmental concerns and those who support the diversity of identity. True blue collar voters, ie, in the traditional sense the waged ‘working class’, may not share either of these concerns. An analogy with Trump’s America? I wonder if Auckland Central tells a story. Who are Chloe’s supporters? MMP and the list MPs tell us nothing.
Here’s part of an email rant I replied to a request for school lunch photo’s a couple of days ago:
“Thanks for the work you are doing to confront the current government’s policies. This is important and necessary but needs to be backed up with some bone and muscle – remember a majority of NZer’s voted for this government and many will be fine with what’s going on. Make the economic case for wealth redistribution and make it loud and clear. Argue against setting low levels of government debt to GDP that require these types of cutbacks. If you don’t then collecting school lunch photo’s is just fluff.
Can you also let the policy makers know that there needs to be a clear and unapologetic case made for the welfare state and the taxes and deficit spending needed to implement it. The narrative and the economic policy fight needs to be taken off the territory that is currently being dictated by David Seymour.
Do not let Seymour dictate the economic narrative for Labour. This is what has happened to the UK Labour Party – after 14 years of Conservative economic talking points; they are now trapped in a self-defeating Stockholm Syndrome obsession with economic growth and austerity. I do not want to see the NZ Labour Party go down this path in 2026. Do not be intimidated by the blustering anti-woke sewerage that is currently accepted as serious political debate and policy making. It is another trap, do not fall into it – stay strong in support of the stuff you’ve always supported – including Maori, including LGBTQ and transgender, including environmental and conservation concerns, including wealth redistribution and genuine support for disability and unemployment, a genuine commitment to a fully funded public health system and the political will to challenge the private health and insurance markets in NZ, a free and open education system for all ages and backgrounds, consideration of a UBI and opening the discussion on a fundamental change in our economic relationship to employment …. okay I’m getting ahead of myself there.”
Economics, economics, economics – Labour and the left must reclaim the economic narrative above all else – not in a ‘radical scare your middle-class neighbors way’ but the same way that Henry Ford, FDR, Michael Savage, Keynes, Jermey Corbyn and Bernie Sanders did. Modern Capitalism depends on the construction and maintenance of a middle class by the welfare state – any simple analysis of the historic economic data demonstrates this fact. The rise in living standards between the 1930’s and 1950’s and today is down to the provision of universal healthcare, education, pensions and welfare from the New Deal in the US and post WW2 Keynesianism across the UK and Europe (and other Western economies) and also in the USSR and China.
There are coherent voices emerging on the economic left and these must be put to use – Gary Stephenson, Steve Keene, Stephanie Kelton.
Talk Radia and Social Media – the right have long ago mastered the art of targeted political and culture war campaigning. They have an integrated network of coordinated think tanks and media funding that is absolutely brilliant at dictating and then holding onto the political narrative. You will need to do the same or employ the people who do it – go to Cambridge Analytica if you have to. Get some of the Brexit or Trump operators on your team and learn how they do it. Social media is now the most important tool for targeting and counter-campaigning for the swing vote.
We on the left also need to target angry and resentful middle aged, middle class white men but with positive messaging about building and investing in a future for their grandchildren etc. About caring for each other and making use of our resources and national labour pool to do good things for those around us.
“Recent reputable opinion polls suggest that, contrary to both historical precedent and most people’s expectations (including mine), the chances of the National-ACT-NZ First coalition being a one-term government are now around 50:50.”
No way. It’s more like 20:80. The precedence that one term governments are exceedingly rare in New Zealand in the first place, coupled with a global right-wing movement… anyone that thinks this government won’t last beyond the first term is high on hopium.
A 50/50 chance? But what the crystal ball won’t show is how MMP will play out. Nor, who quite knows how the international scene will develop and how that might impact domestic politics. Favourable to trade and the current coalition will take the credit. A buiding world wide recession – not off the cards given decisions beung made by the Trump administration – and all bets are off.
Notice how the few colonists left in the UK are scared shitless because the people from the colonies have come to take over the mother country . The same is happening here the colonizers are shitting their pants because the colonized are saying no more we can stand on our own thanks .The other problem they are facing here is they have flooded the country with cheap labour which is now also demanding a fair go so the % of colonists is declining soon they will be the bottom feeders .
Great work! This is the type of info that should
be shared around the internet. Shame on the seek engines
for no longer positioning this put up higher! Come on over and talk over with my
website . Thank you =)