NZ First edges ahead of ACT, Greens in new poll

Thursday, 10 July 2025

NZ First has edged ahead of coalition partner ACT and the Green Party in the latest political poll.

A Taxpayers’ Union poll, run by Curia Research, published on Thursday showed NZ First to be the third-most supported party in Parliament by a slight margin, sitting at 9.8%, due to a 3.7 percentage points increase in support for the party from the month prior.

The poll echoes others which have shown building support for NZ First, led by veteran politician Winston Peters, who in May relinquished the deputy prime minister position to ACT leader David Seymour as part of the deal struck to form the Coalition Government.

Overall, the poll showed the coalition ahead of the centre-left parties, and able to again form a Government if an election were to produce this poll’s result. ACT was unchanged from the month before at 9.1%, and National gained a fractional 0.4 percentage points to reach 33.9% support among those surveyed.

NZ First’s gain appeared to be at Labour’s loss. The Opposition party was down 3.2 percentage points, at 31.6%.

Labour lacked the support to govern when combined with 9.4% for the Green Party, an increase of 1.2 percentage points on the month prior, and 3.5% for Te Pāti Māori, increasing 0.2 percentage points. The bloc was down three seats in Parliament compared to the poll run in June, at 57 seats.

The Coalition Government parties, however, would have a sufficient 65 seats, according to this poll.

The poll, run between Wednesday, July 2, and Sunday, July 6, surveyed 1000 people and was weighted to reflect the overall voting population. Of those surveyed, 7.9% were undecided on who they would give their party vote to. The poll’s margin of error was 3.1%.

Those surveyed placed National leader Christopher Luxon and Labour leader Chris Hipkins at almost neck-and-neck as “preferred prime minister”.

Luxon was down 0.6 percentage points on the month prior, at 19.7%. Hipkins was up 1.1 percentage points, at 19.6%.

Peters, the NZ First leader, improved 1.3 percentage points, at 9.3%. Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick was up 1.4 percentage points, at 7%. Seymour, the ACT leader, was down 0.3 percentage points, at 5.7% support as preferred prime minister.

When it came to the biggest issues for voters, those polled put “cost of living” as the highest concern, overtaking “economy” from the prior month.

Some 21.6% of those polled said cost of living was the most important issue, 19.6% said it was the economy, and 13.3% said it was health.

The issues of importance after these were as follows: employment, poverty, law and order, Treaty of Waitangi, environment, housing and education.