David Seymour could be the next New Zealand Prime Minister if a poll conducted amongst Coromandel voters is an indication of party support in the Peninsula.

The poll conducted by Coromandel’s CFM has produced some dramatic results in voter support for the two main political parties. Both Labour and National have lost ground in the poll that looked at party support on the Coromandel. On election night 2020, Labour had the highest Coromandel party vote with 42.31%, National followed with 32.5%, ACT was third with 9.62% and the Green Party came in fourth position with 5.58%.

The Coromandel CFM poll shows support for Labour plummeting to 25.1%, equal with National. ACT is the major winner with 26.2%. The Green party also increased their share to 7.3%.

ACT increased support was from disenchanted National and Labour 2020 voters. More than 1 in 3 who party voted National at the last General Election had moved their support to ACT while nearly 20% of previous Labour party voters now supported ACT.

The poll was conducted on Facebook over 7 days and closed at 5pm 23 July. 386 responses to the survey were received which not only asked for party vote preferences but also measured satisfaction with the performance of both the Government and opposition parties. The poll was done at a particularly volatile time with farmers protests and issues such as the Auckland harbour crossing for cyclists getting adverse coverage.

The Government’s average satisfaction rating was 2.5 (on a scale of 1 to 5 with 1 low and 5 high). Not surprisingly, those who voted Labour and Greens had a high rating for Government performance of 3.9 support while ACT and National supporters gave the government a 1.6 rating.

Labour and Greens supporters using the same scale rated the Opposition at 1.8 with ACT and National supporters rating Opposition performance at 2.5. Overall, the rating for the Opposition was 2.2.

David Seymour on hearing the result said “The race is long, there are 26 months to the election, but obviously we’re grateful for this boost from the Coromandel. It encourages us to work harder to be the region’s representatives next election.”

On the reasons for support, he stated “We believe the Government has got confused, winning an election in the middle of a crisis doesn’t give you the mandate to transform people’s lives against their will. Rural New Zealand in particular are facing an overwhelming avalanche of reform from fresh water to three waters, and it’s being done undemocratically.

“ACT sees its role as giving a voice against rushed and poorly thought through laws, while proposing better alternatives. We’ve used Parliament’s winter recess to tour the country and listen to New Zealanders, while releasing new ideas for housing, law and order, and recovering the economy from COVID.”

Local National MP Scott Simpson said that polls are all very volatile at present and with two years to go before the next election people will be perhaps a little freer with their views. He also said that self-selected polls like this one aren’t scientific but were valuable to him as a local MP.

He felt the dramatic shift indicated away from Labour was due to unpopular recent decisions based on political ideology. Examples given were the He Paupua agenda, tax on utes, treatment of farmers, slow covid vaccine roll out and spending commitments on the Auckland Harbour cycle/walkway.

Labour was also asked to comment but had not responded by the requested time.

David Seymour will be on air tomorrow at 11:10am with Rex Simpson to discuss the poll and Scott Simpson will follow at around 11:40am.

About Coromandel’s CFM – The station has 5 transmission sites and covers most of the populated areas of the Coromandel Peninsula. It also has a transmitter near Miranda and broadcasts to the Western coast of the Coromandel and large areas of the Northern Waikato including Paeroa and Te Aroha. A broadcast area with a population of nearly 60,000 people. The station is independently owned and commenced broadcasts in November 2018.

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