Mike's Minute: This is why Labour will lose the election

Author: Mike Hosking ,
Publish Date: Wed, 1 Jul 2026, 10:40am

Labour will not have move on orders and Labour will undo the social housing changes, which don’t actually start anyway until next year.

These are their latest policies and it's these ideas and policies that will lead to their election loss.

Social housing assistance is being adjusted so the money can be offset in the private sector, so those paying more can get a better deal. It's a perfectly logical policy.

It's unfair for a person in social public housing to get a better deal than a person in social private housing, unless the state provides every social house, which it doesn’t and never will.

One person pays less because of their luck. Labour thinks that's good policy. They are wrong.

The main problem with the current version of Labour is they are not the Labour aligned to Mike Moore or David Lange or Annette King or Helen Clark.

Middle Labour. Sensible Labour.

Move-on orders deal with people who cause trouble, mainly downtown. It's not the homeless per se, as pedalled by Labour and the media. It's not some poor, tragic soul quietly in a corner wondering what's happened to their life.

It’s the troublemaker, the violent, threatening thug, the person who abuses you, attacks you, causes trouble and a scene, often as a result of too many drugs.

They frighten people, they kill business. They have no more rights than the rest of us and yet it's those people Labour support.

Can't move them on because they deserve more rights than the rest of us.

Now, Labour are entitled to believe this, and they are entitled to promote it as a reason to vote for them.

The trouble is this version of Labour is hopelessly out of touch with middle New Zealand and middle New Zealand wins and loses elections.

Opposing the Government for the sake of it is not mature or well thought through.

Explain the logic of a person in a state house paying less just because it’s a state house. It literally makes no sense and yet because the Government did it, it must be wrong.

Explain to the business owner why the drugged-out deadbeat blocking your shop door has more right to be there than the customer who can't get in.

That's Labour 2026. And that’s why they're going to lose.