Labour’s Auckland redemption: Can it win back the supercity?

Sunday, 9 March 2025

It’s the biggest city with the country’s largest, most diverse voter base. And in 2023, following an historic victory three years earlier, Auckland voters turned their back on Labour.

The anatomy of the party’s dramatic election loss has been well-dissected in the 18 months since, but the story in Auckland remains compelling.

In 2020, the supercity delivered a result of 52.4% for Labour. That plummeted to just over 29% three years later at the 2023 election- and just 26.9% nationwide, one of its worst results. Large swathes of the city went red to blue, including in party strongholds like Mount Roskill and New Lynn. Another, Mount Albert, went to Labour by a whisker-thin 18 votes after a recount.

It was more than just a symptom of Labour’s nationwide result. For comparison, in 2014, when David Cunliffe led the party to a similarly disastrous result of 25.1%, it managed to hold onto its Auckland fortresses. Something was different about 2023.

It’s been widely accepted that the protracted Covid-19 lockdown of 2021 was the primary cause of the drop in support. That was just “the tipping point”, argues Chris Hipkins, who told the Sunday Star-Times there was already a perception that Labour had lost touch, at a grassroots level, with parts of the city.

“To some extent, the early part of the Covid experience masked that,” he explained.

“We were so popular because of what we were doing with managing the pandemic, it kind of masked the fact that there were still some underlying issues even at that point in the way Labour was working in Auckland. So plugging back into those kind of grassroots organisations in Auckland has been a real focus.”

Hipkins was minister in charge of the Covid response at the time of the lockdown before becoming prime minister less than two years later.

Since losing the last election, he has made a concerted effort to win back support for Labour in Auckland. The party held a two-day retreat in the city last year, with Hipkins admitting he and his party weren’t visible enough during the Covid years.

The Labour leader is now in the city most weeks, along with senior members of the party. They’ve been listening, taking stock and biding their time.

And on Friday, Hipkins gave a substantive speech in front of a business audience in central Auckland, laying out his priorities for the campaign ahead and his plan to regain support in the city.

‘The phone's back on the hook’

Speaking to the Star-Times ahead of his speech, Hipkins acknowledged how important Auckland was to Labour winning re-election in 18 months’ time. “It's not the only thing that matters. You can still win government whilst being a bit behind in Auckland, but you can't win government if you're a long way behind in Auckland.”

That illustrates the uphill battle the party has been fighting since October 2023. The party was a long way behind, and while nationwide polling has shown growing support for the opposition - along with dipping support for the current government - Labour wouldn’t reveal this week whether it had data to show its performance in the supercity.

Regardless, using a “Mike Moore-ism” from the 1990s, Hipkins said things were improving.

“The phone's back on the hook,” he said. “[Former prime minister Moore] talked… about the fact that the phone was off the hook. You could ring, [but] no one was answering. Now, the phone's back on the hook, so they're willing to talk to us now. And I think that's the first step.

“The next step is to kind of make sure you have a good ongoing discussion.”

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown told the Star-Times that Labour’s mistake while in office was that it was too Wellington-centric.

“They do seem to have learnt the lesson. They had too many big projects, [like] Auckland Light Rail and the Waitematā Harbour tunnel without involving [council],” said Brown.

“They do appear to have learnt that that was the wrong thing to do, and that’s very important. National got voted in because Auckland voters crossed over to National, and they could quite possibly do it back again the other way. We need a lot less Wellington.”

Brown said he had a good working relationship with both major parties, detailing a recent unexpected conversation he had with Hipkins - after emerging from the waters of “Browny’s Pool” on Auckland’s waterfront.

“I got out after doing a few lengths and there was Mr Hipkins waiting to talk to me,” the mayor said. “I’m not partisan, I’ll work with whoever gets in but I’ll be encouraging Aucklanders to support whoever is offering the best deal for Auckland.”

The question of trust

So far this cycle, Labour has opted not to “bark at every passing car” - in the words of Hipkins - and has instead targeted specific vulnerabilities it sees in the current government’s policy programme. Policies will be rolled out in the latter half of this year and into 2026.

Shanan Halbert, who until Friday was Labour’s spokesperson for Auckland, told the Star-Times that the party had been listening to the electorate and had been running an engagement programme.

“Our polls have been looking good for us but Auckland is an instrumental part of Labour winning a future government and so we’ve got to work hard in that,” said Halbert.

Internal insights provided to Labour by its pollsters Talbot Mills, and seen by the Star-Times, showed the most important issues to voters across the city over the past six months, unsurprisingly, were the cost of living and the economy, followed by crime, health and employment.

“That’s where people want to see the change, that’s where they potentially voted for change last time,” said Halbert. “It hasn’t turned out better and so they're seriously looking at an alternative.”

Halbert acknowledged that voters needed to be able to trust Labour after a perception that the party had failed to deliver on core promises while in government.

A reshuffle announced before the weekend saw deputy leader Carmel Sepuloni move into the Auckland issues role.

“I know that Auckland’s success will be New Zealand’s success,” said Hipkins in his state of the nation.

Political commentator and former National Party press secretary Ben Thomas said it would be hard for Labour to convince disaffected voters that the party would be able to deliver this time.

“Will people forgive Chris Hipkins and Labour? They’ll be open to it the longer tough times continue and you see that in Labour’s polling. But in terms of what actually makes Labour seem like a positive option to vote for, it’s a lot harder if it’s the same old faces saying the same old things but ‘this time we’ll actually do it’.”

Halbert also criticised the current Minister for Auckland, Simeon Brown, whom he said had been missing in action.

“[He] has only taken two papers to cabinet in the 18 months he has been in the role. They do not demonstrate a programme of work, or any meaningful actions, or any accountabilities that he will be responsible to for the Auckland public.

“He’s scaled back the minister for Auckland role to be purely a coordination function - that’s not good enough. Our city needs real leadership.”

Brown, in response, told the Star-Times the role of Minister for Auckland was “primarily … about advocacy” and he had taken five papers to cabinet. “From looking at the previous government’s answers to written questions, it appears that the former ministers for Auckland took only two papers to cabinet during the previous term of Parliament.”

Same leader, same team - new policies?

If the past 18 months have been about listening and learning, it must soon be time for a plan.

“We want to work with you as we finalise … policy, not just tell you how it’s going to be,” Hipkins said in his state of the nation on Friday, alongside a reshuffle with a renewed focus on the economy.

Barbara Edmonds remains finance spokesperson, joined by Ginny Andersen in a new role focused on jobs and income and Peeni Henare in economic development.

“We need to build an economy that ends the reliance on trickle-down and instead grows from the local community out,” Hipkins said.

“Where an idea that starts around a kitchen table or in a garage can be turned into a new business.”

New policies would be announced “this year, not in the weeks before election day,” he added, with a focus on three priorities: jobs, health and homes.

The challenge for any opposition - but especially one trying to dethrone a government after just three years - was to present itself as a credible alternative, said former Labour leader David Cunliffe.

“Labour, at some point in the cycle, and it arguably is too soon, needs to put out a plan for integrated growth and sustainable growth that will be different from National’s but it needs to be coherent and convincing,” Cunliffe said.

“It can’t be just about tax. As important as tax is, it is one aspect of a bigger picture. That plan needs to convince Auckland business that Labour will be responsible custodians of the economy and that they have some good answers to tough questions.”

This was echoed by Viv Beck, chief executive of Auckland’s central business lobby group Heart of the City. She said any prospective government should be focused on “encouraging investment and incentivising initiatives for growth”, with events like the America’s Cup key to this.

“We’ve got the infrastructure and to have something so significant on the radar for 2027 would be fantastic right now because we’ve had a significant setback, we’re turning a corner and we’ve just got to keep the feet on the accelerator now around growth and positive opportunity,” she said.

“I’m also not clear what the delay is with looking at a visitor levy. Auckland has put up a case for a local one and I really hope we’re going to see some action around that.”

Beck said there had been a “significant effort” by Labour under Hipkins, since before the last election, to engage more with Auckland - which had been welcomed. “Those relationships have endured,” she said.

Wayne Brown, too, has been pushing for a levy and urged both major parties to take up the idea and run with it.

“National has been very slow on this and potentially that cost us economically,” the mayor said, also reiterating his call for New Zealand to reciprocate China’s policy of 30-days visa-free access.

Infrastructure was also an important issue for the city, but Ben Thomas said Labour may have a credibility issue.

“They come from the Kiwibuild failure, the light rail failure… And so it’s hard to see, without the personnel changing or without some demonstrably new idea, how do they regain that trust,” he said.

Hipkins has largely maintained his personal popularity rating since the last election, though he is hardly popular - the latest 1News Verian poll had him on 17%, behind the prime minister on 22%.

“Can you change nothing except the leader and will that have an impact? Or can you change everything but the leader and will that have an impact?” asked Thomas.

“It might be a bit optimistic to think that presenting the same leader with similar policies is going to effect a big turnaround.”

Hipkins, however, said it was entirely possible the current coalition could be a one-term government, noting that the Democrats were turfed out after four years in the United States and that polls remained too close to call in Australia, where the Liberals are nipping at Labor’s heels.

“That we're already polling ahead of the National Party and we're only a year and a bit in - that's almost unheard of in New Zealand,” he said.

Halbert, too, said more doors were opening to himself and his Labour colleagues.

“People are wanting to have conversations around Labour about what a future government could look like.

“Our polls have been looking good for us but Auckland is an instrumental part of Labour winning a future government and so we’ve got to work hard in that.”

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