Election 2023: Labour polls at 27pc in Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll for September

Labour has taken another hit in the latest political poll and PM Chris Hipkins and National leader Christopher Luxon are once again equal as preferred prime minister. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Labour has been hit by its third bad poll in a week, polling just 27 per cent in September’s Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll.

The silver lining is that 27 per cent is unchanged from last month’s poll. National is well ahead on 35 per cent, again unchanged from last month.

Act continues to climb, hitting 14 per cent, while the Greens are also up one to 13 points.

Te Pāti Māori is on 3 per cent, which is no change on last month. NZ First is on 4 per cent, down two points on last month.

On those numbers, National and Act could govern comfortably alone with 64 seats.

NZ First would be out of Parliament.

Chris Hipkins and Christopher Luxon are once again equal as preferred prime minister, with 25 per cent each. Luxon is actually slightly ahead with 25.3 per cent compared to 25.1 per cent.

Luxon continued to trail Hipkins in net favour ability, with a score of -4 per cent compared to Hipkins’ +16 per cent.

Among “unsure voters” Hipkins had 41 per cent favourability compared to Luxon’s -46 per cent.

A net 36 per cent of people think the country is on the wrong track. The cost of living is the most important issue for voters, on 36 per cent, followed by the economy on 14 per cent, and health on 7 per cent.

The centre-right parties now have a narrow lead among women voters, polling 49 per cent to the centre left’s 47 per cent, a change from last month when centre-right parties polled 44 per cent among women versus 53 per cent for centre-left parties.

The poll was conducted between August 31 and September 6, taking in National’s tax policy announcement and the weekend campaign launches for both major parties. It polled 1000 respondents.

This poll is the third piece of bad news for Labour this week, after a Talbot Mills poll and The Post-Freshwater poll also showed the party performing poorly.

Labour was on 30 in Talbot Mills, one of its worst scores in that poll since it went into government in 2017.

National is on 36 per cent, up one point. The Greens are also up, hitting 12 per cent, up two points. Act has fallen one point to 10 per cent.

Thomas Coughlan is Deputy Political Editor and covers politics from Parliament. He has worked for the Herald since 2021 and has worked in the press gallery since 2018.