Barry Soper: Newstalk ZB senior political correspondent on Luxon calling an in-person caucus meeting tomorrow

There's a fork in the road of the National Party, as speculation looms around the Prime Minister's leadership.

Christopher Luxon's called an urgent in-person caucus meeting tomorrow morning to resolve the issue quickly. 

In a post online, Luxon says it's a major distraction 90 days out from an election - and unfair to the New Zealand people and National's supporters. 

Newstalk ZB senior political correspondent Barry Soper says a change at the top could increase the public's perception of disunity.

"And if you're a disunified party, then rarely will the public say - we want to vote for you. So it's a big play, whichever way you look at it." 

Parliament's in recess this week - meaning MPs will travel from around the country.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from News Talks at B
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Speaker 2 (00:17):
Christopher Luckxon has called an urgent in person national Caucus
meeting for tomorrow morning at nine point thirty am to
put an end to growing speculation about his leadership. Joining
us Right now is News Talks heb Senior political correspondent
Barry soaper Gette.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
Barry, Good afternoon, Tyler.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
So, first up, is this a wise move from Christopher Luxen?

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Oh, well, you know the fact that we all knew
that he proposed a vote of confidence in himself earlier
this year. Speculation starts as it has done over the
past couple of days, and it's a bit like a
stone gathering moss. And this particular stone has been rolling

(00:56):
down the hill now for some months. But and the
few gaffs and the gaffs if you look at them
relating to Christopher Luckson have been actually very very minor.
And you know the call on MMP a referendum, Well
that's the Prime minister's call to make just forget just
Dern made a captain's call on capital gains tax and

(01:19):
got away with it. So the stuff that he's been doing,
and even telling the business people that they can't come
to parent government for handouts all the time. I think
was a veh call, but it was part of a
conversation as well. So I think if there's anything that
you could criticize Luxe and for its being a little

(01:39):
too loquacious but too keen on talking and says more
than what a guarded politician would say. And I think
that says a lot about the time that he's been
in politics. I mean, he's only been there four and
a half years in or how on, it's five and
a half years since he came in. But if you

(02:02):
look at now his own caucus, almost a third of
them fifteen of the forty nine corks our first terms. Now,
these are people that really may understand something about politics,
but they don't understand the nuance that changing a leader
is going to increase the chances. What it does is
is it increases the public's perception of disunity in the party.

(02:27):
And if you're a disunified party, then rarely did the
public say we want to vote for you. So it's
a big play whichever way you look at it.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Was Winston right back in April a text alluded to this,
and when he called for the vote back in April
and Winston Peters came out and said he's going to
regret that that was a poor move and he's had
to hold another caucus meeting for another potential vote there.
So was Winston right in the start that maybe that
wasn't the best move to try and put that line
in the sand.

Speaker 3 (02:54):
No, he is right to an extent, because I mean,
Winston is an old campaigner. I mean it's not that
as though his own leadership has ever been challenged, so
he doesn't know what it's like to be the subject
of a leadership bid against him. But look, there are
people that are dissatisfied if you look at the opinion
polls for the National Party, even though they increased in

(03:19):
the last poll, whereas National dropped quite significantly by almost
four percent. Now, who knows. It could have been Labor
out there basically stirring the pot and some people getting
a hold of it and then going to National MPs
not the unhappy ones, and starting that stone to roll again. Yeah,

(03:42):
I think probably tactically it was a bad move. But
I think that Chris Luxen thought that he would have
stopped it there and then. But the gaffes recently, and
like I say, they're minor, but they're enough for some
of the more naive politicians to say, look this man,
he won't win come the election. Well it shows just

(04:06):
how much they know about politics.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Why can't he smoke the descenders out? Is there too
many descendants at this stage to maybe smoke out? And
follow up question, I mean, could you ever see Donkey
or Helen Clark getting into this position?

Speaker 3 (04:19):
Well, Helen Clark, you may remember, it was she was
preyed upon. She wasn't the Prime minister, but she was
the leader of the opposition and she was known as
Miss three percent, so it could never get her personal
popularity ratings very high at all. And then a group
of MPs went and waited on her, and they included
Annet King, Michael Cullen, Mike Moore and the like and said, look,

(04:42):
it's time you should move on, while she said, bugger you,
I'm staying where I am. But what did she do
She promoted them to the front bench. Yes, so if
you do have detractors, it's better to put them in
a position that they really no longer want to challenge.
But Unfortunately, there are a couple in the national Party
caucus at the moment that could see themselves as potential leaders,

(05:07):
and they're probably not discouraging people from getting out there
and stirring the pot on their behalf.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
So the numbers of the vote in April have been released. Well,
the one of the dissenters told Thomas Coglin it was
in the vicinity of twenty seven to twenty two in
favor of lux and Stain leader. But with that might
who has those numbers. It's the whips, right, So clearly
there is a leader.

Speaker 3 (05:28):
It's a secret ballot, so there are only two people
that know the numbers. Now, neither of those two are
going to be in the possession of saying yeah, we
lacked the numbers to the media, and I doubt whether
they would. I mean, that's a very trusting job being
a whip of a political party. So it's speculation. And
who knows who put those numbers out there, because no

(05:49):
one really knows, and you can put a number out
there can be neither proved or disproved, even by Luxon himself,
although I'm sure he probably has a pretty good idea
of how much he survived by the last time. But look,
you know, I thought he was courageous putting it to
the vote because it could have gone either way. But

(06:09):
he did that. He obviously felt he solidified his position
being the leader of the party. But you've still got
detractors out there that believe they could turn the fortunes
of National around a bit better than he could.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
So looking a head to tomorrow morning, Barry, what do
you think his chances are of survival?

Speaker 3 (06:32):
Depends on how he plays this. If he goes in again,
and certainly the speculation about leadership doesn't help any leader.
If he goes in there and says, look, you know,
we've had a gut full of this. What you're doing
is you're destroying the party's potential for the coming election,

(06:53):
people will either back down or say no, you're doing that.
We want to vote and we've got the numbers. He
may in fact find out that they have the numbers tonight,
And if they do have the numbers, then I would imagine,
knowing Chris Luxon as I do, he would probably do
the honorable thing and resign. But if they don't have
the numbers, he'll steer them down again, probably, but it

(07:15):
never looks good for a leadership having to fight to
the extent that he's had to fight, and don't forget
he took over a poison chalice when he became not
just the leader of the National Party but the Prime ministers.
A hell of a thing to turn around, and that's
the problem when you go into an election you promise
so much as they did at the last election and

(07:36):
realized once they got in there, when they saw the
color of the box, it was they were bleeding and
it was it's very hard to turn that around the
short time.

Speaker 2 (07:45):
It's been a hell of an election campaign so far
and we're still ninety days out.

Speaker 3 (07:50):
A lot more talking to come time.

Speaker 2 (07:51):
Absolutely great to see that is News Talks. He'd be
senior political correspondent Barry Soaper.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
For more from News Talks. The'd be listen live on
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