National and its problems, right?

Twenty-eight point four percent in the polling is a significant problem for National. It seems to me they’ve got four options for how to deal with this in an election year:

1) Continue with Chris Luxon
2) Switch to Chris Bishop
3) Switch to Erica Stanford
4) Or, switch to Mark Mitchell.

I think sticking with Chris Luxon is a credible option simply because changing a sitting Prime Minister eight months out from an election is an incredibly risky thing to do. It signals instability. But then again, a leader who can’t articulate a simple foreign policy position on whether New Zealand supports bombing Iran doesn’t really look like stability, does he? It knocks confidence in the leader and his lack of popularity is now clearly dragging National down in the polls. He is a drag on the party.

Chris Bishop is good in media interviews. He’s not going to make the same basic mistakes Chris Luxon does. He’s got a very good political radar as well. He’s also, I think, lefty enough—or liberal enough—that he could probably be in the Labour Party if he wanted to, so he has appeal across the political spectrum.

But unfortunately for him, he is a street fighter, and everyone can see that he’s a street fighter, and that makes it a bit harder for your mum to vote for him, if you know what I mean. He also shot his chance, frankly, with caucus after trying to roll Luxon last year, so they’re not going to support him.

Erica Stanford is really well liked publicly so she has some appeal and she’s from Auckland, which counts for a lot. She is strong in her portfolios—excellent in education, very good in interviews. She’s liberal enough to appeal to Labour and left-leaning voters.

But she’s untested on everything a Prime Minister needs to know. She’s great in interviews on subjects she knows, but have you ever heard her interviewed on a subject she doesn’t know? She also has an instinct to fight dirty, which I don’t think is quite as appealing in a female politician, and she might burn herself out with anxiety and micromanaging.

Mark Mitchell has the cuddly dad appeal. That is by far his biggest asset. He’s a nice guy—you can see it, you like him, he’s likeable. He’s also sure of his own mind, which counts for a lot when you think about how Luxon’s indecisiveness has hurt him.

The problem for Mark Mitchell is that while he’s great in his portfolios, has he really been tested in other areas? Is he across all the detail a Prime Minister needs?

Now, if you said to me, “I’m in the National Party caucus and I have to put my money on what’s going to work”—and it is a wild guess, because no one knows—I would say a combo of Erica Stanford and Mark Mitchell is probably the way to go: one as leader, one as deputy.

But bold call. Whether I would pull the trigger in an election year, I’m not sure. It’s a bold move to switch leaders this close to voting and it would take Luxon giving himself up for that to happen because they are not going to roll him. They want an orderly handover.

And at the moment, as you heard from him, there is no sign that he is in that head space just yet.

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