Political poll: National in government as Labour and Jacinda Ardern tumble

National could govern with the support of Act in the latest Taxpayers' Union-Curia poll, winning the support of 37 per cent of voters, up three points on last month's poll.

Support party Act was also up, rising one point to 12 per cent.

National's rise coincided with a record number of people saying the country was heading in the wrong direction.

Fifty-four per cent of people say the country is heading in the wrong direction, but just 32 per cent of people thought it was heading in the right direction.

The rise in support came amidst declines in Labour's polling. It fell two points between August and September to 33 per cent, while the Greens stayed static at 10 per cent.

Te Pāti Māori polled 1.5 per cent, NZ First was at 1.6 per cent, the New Conservatives were at 1.5 per cent, and TOP was at 0.7 per cent.

The numbers would give National 47 seats and Act 16 seats - enough to govern. Previous polls had shown they would need the support of Te Pāti Māori to form a government.

Labour would lose 22 MPs, being left with just 42. National would have 47.

National leader Christopher Luxon will be buoyed by the Preferred Prime Minister poll. His rating rose a whole six points to 26.

However, this was still behind the rating of Labour leader Jacinda Ardern, who was on 37 per cent, down three points.

Act leader David Seymour continued to poll well for a minor party leader, hitting 6.6 per cent.

Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick polled 3.2 per cent, ahead of co-leaders Marama Davidson who was on 1.4 per cent and James Shaw who polled 1 per cent.

The poll was taken before Shaw was reelected co-leader.

Luxon also saw an increase in his favourability rating, which dipped into negatives last month. This was matched by a halving of Ardern's net favourability.

Luxon's net favourability was zero, meaning an equal number of people favoured him as did not - both ratings were 35 per cent.

Ardern's net favourability was 4 per cent, as the number of people who favoured her fell to 44 per cent from 45 and the number of people who did not favour her rose to 40 per cent from 35 per cent.

Cost of living issues continued to dominate as a "major voting issue" on 22 per cent, well ahead of Covid-19 which polled just 3 per cent.

The poll was taken in the nine days up to last Thursday evening and sampled 1000 eligible voters. It had a margin of error of 3.1 per cent.