By Natalia Albert*
Winston Peters has turned into a pantomime villain, the man who turned up to the COVID protest camp and who has been accused of betraying every political ally he has ever had. Peters is also a political phenomenon: the politician who, across 10 MMP elections, built and rebuilt a position of genuine cross-bloc leverage, deciding the shape of three governments and nearly two more.
Both of those versions about him are true, but today I will address the latter. The version of Peters that has a very effective political blueprint. And it is worth being precise about what that blueprint requires, because the commentary around the Opportunity Party keeps blurring the difference between resembling a kingmaker and being one. Because love him or loath him, he’s got his foot on our politics neck.
The Peters model, properly understood
You do not become a kingmaker by announcing you will work with either side. You become one by building the structural conditions that make that possible. There are four of them.
First, an electorate seat. Peters survived the 1999 election on a margin of 63 votes in Tauranga. NZ First’s party vote had collapsed to 4.3%, well below the 5% threshold, after voters punished the party for going with National in 1996. The electorate lifeline rule kept him in parliament. Without Tauranga, Peters is a footnote. The seat was structural insurance: it meant his party could survive a party-vote collapse and live to fight another day. He spent the following decade treating that seat as his personal property and his voters knew it.
Second, a voter base whose loyalty seems personal. NZ First voters follow Peters, not NZ First.
Third, a voter base with some perceived cross-bloc origins. Peters’ signature issues, immigration restriction and economic nationalism, are right-coded. But his anti-establishment populism and interventionist economic nationalism gave him reach into Labour-leaning provincial and Māori voters who felt left behind by urban-centred policymaking, while his cultural conservatism kept him credible with National.
NZ First voters placed themselves fitting the centre on most scales, which is part of why the party fits poorly into standard radical right categories. Their economics were interventionist enough to do business with Labour. Their cultural conservatism was credible enough to do business with National. That dual legibility was structural.
Fourth, demonstrated willingness to go the other way. In 1996, Peters went with National. In 2005, he supported Helen Clark's Labour government as Foreign Minister outside cabinet. In 2017, Labour again, this time in coalition with Jacinda Ardern. In 2023, back to National. His credibility as a swing actor came precisely from having made each of those calls. A party that has only ever gone one way is not a kingmaker. It is a reliable coalition partner, which is a much weaker negotiating position.
Where Wong sits against that blueprint
Qiulae Wong, the Opportunity Party leader, has none of the four, yet.
She is standing in Mt Albert, where Labour’s Helen White held on by 18 votes in 2023, the slimmest margin of that election. If Wong wins it, she has her electorate insurance. That is a genuine possibility, though she has been publicly realistic about the odds. The seat is tight enough that it is not fantasy. It is also the one part of the blueprint she could plausibly achieve in the next six months.
Opportunity’s voter base is concentrated in the progressive, urban, highly educated demographic that also considers voting Green or Labour. These are not voters with cross-bloc loyalty. They are left-leaning voters who are temporarily frustrated with Labour and looking for somewhere to park their vote. That is a real political constituency, and it is worth having. But it is not the same as Peters’ base, and it will not hold if Wong goes right.
The policy identity problem is real and has been real since the party was founded. Commentary going back to 2017 has noted the same contradiction: Opportunity wants to be both a Wellington policy-wonk party and a down-to-earth outsider party for people sick of the establishment. It has struggled to be both, and the tension has never been resolved. Neither of those identities is cross coded in the way Peters’ issues were. Climate commitments and tax reform are left-coded. They attract centre-left voters. They do not attract the kind of National-leaning voter who might consider swinging to a third party if the policy offer was right.
And Wong has never gone right. It may be entirely deliberate, and it may be the right call for building the party in 2026. But it means that the “work with either side” framing is, at this point, a positioning statement rather than a demonstrated capacity. National’s strategists know that. Labour’s strategists know that too, which is part of why they are not panicking. A party that can only credibly go one way is not a kingmaker. It is a lever.
What Opportunity’s strategy is
Wong’s team have been clear about their model.
Opportunity is explicitly chasing the party vote. Their stated target is 150,000 votes to clear 5%. They are standing in over 30 electorates, not to win seats outright, but to build local presence and visibility for the party vote. Wong is realistic about Mt Albert. The strategy does not depend on the electorate lifeboat. It is an all-in 5% play.
The framing they use for this is “teal.” They describe themselves explicitly as centrist, bridging Labour and the Greens on environment and National on the economy. The pitch to voters is a version of “keep Labour honest on the economy, keep National honest on the environment, keep the extremes out of Cabinet.” It is designed to sound cross-bloc, and in the right political environment, it could attract voters from both sides. The problem is that their actual strategy does not match their positioning.
The teal model they are borrowing from is the Australian one, where independent candidates won specific seats in blue-green electorates where moderate Liberal incumbents were vulnerable to a cross-party environmental challenge. Those wins were built on individual candidates with strong local credibility in specific communities. They were seat wins, not party vote wins. Translating that model into a New Zealand MMP context requires something the Australian teals did not need: a party vote base that genuinely spans left and right.
Look at who Opportunity is targeting. Their demographic is young people, students, first-time voters, and under-30 professionals frustrated with the status quo. Their named funders are AJ Wilderland, co-founder of Serato, and Philip Mills, founder of Les Mills International, both with strong sustainability and climate focuses. Their headline policies include a land value tax and a citizen’s income alongside climate action and affordable housing. These are not cross-coded signals. They are left-coded signals with a centrist wrapper.
None of this is a criticism of the policies. A land value tax is good policy. So is a UBI-style citizen’s income, if any party manages to do actual tax reform policy. But a voter in Tauranga or Tāmaki who might once have parked their vote with NZ First is not looking at that policy suite and thinking “this is my party.” Opportunity’s actual voter base is progressive voters who are dissatisfied with Labour and the Greens, not National voters looking for a more environmentally credible home. That is a real constituency. But it is not the cross-bloc base the kingmaker claim requires.
Peters’ leverage in 2017 and 2023 was credible because National genuinely did not know which way he would go, because his voters genuinely did not know either, and because his policy identity gave him structural reach in both directions. Opportunity’s funders, demographics, and policy suite tell a coherent story, but it is a story about a progressive minor party with a centrist brand, not a genuinely cross-bloc actor. The “keep National honest on the environment” line sounds like leverage. It is only leverage if National believes Wong can credibly walk away from a Labour deal and go right. Nothing in the current strategy suggests she can.
What Wong would need to do
To replicate the Peters model, Wong would need to either extend the timeline or compress the requirements. Extending the timeline means accepting that 2026 is a building election, winning Mt Albert, getting a toehold in parliament, and spending the next three to six years deliberately cultivating a cross-coded voter base and policy identity before the real kingmaker play is available. That is the honest version of the strategy, and it has internal coherence.
Compressing the requirements is harder. To arrive at November with genuine cross-bloc leverage, Wong would need to do something that demonstrably costs her with her current voter base but gains her on the other side. That could be a specific policy position that draws right-leaning environmentally minded voters, the kind of voter who used to park with National’s blue-green wing before the current government made that impossible. It could be a concrete signal that she is willing to give National something real in exchange for something real. It would need to be credible enough that National’s strategists start thinking about whether there is a deal to be had.
None of that is currently happening. The campaign is well-funded, Iain Lees-Galloway running the operation as general manager is a solid appointment. The $500,000 war chest is real money by the party’s historical standards. But the structural requirements for kingmaker status are not fundraising requirements. They are voter-base and policy-identity requirements, and those take longer to build than a campaign cycle.
The wasted-vote trap and what it means for November
The more immediate question is whether Opportunity can break 5% at all. The wasted-vote trap is circular and well-documented: voters who like the party will not risk their vote on it if they do not believe it can win, which means it cannot win, which confirms their caution. Bryce Edwards, writing in The Democracy Project this week, notes that the party is currently averaging around 2.3% for the year, with the most recent 1News/Verian poll showing 3.3%.
No new party has entered parliament under MMP without a leader who already held a seat. Peter Dunne put the trap plainly: people like you, they just do not believe you can make it, so they will not waste their vote, so you do not make it.
On current polling, Labour is tracking between 34% and 37% depending on the pollster, which translates to roughly 42 to 46 seats. The Greens are around 11%, worth approximately 13 to 14 seats. Te Pāti Māori are at 2%, surviving on their electorate lifeline. That combination gets the left bloc to the government benches, but without margin. A 5% Opportunity party sitting alongside Labour on confidence and supply changes that picture materially.
A wasted 3% Opportunity vote drawn from the progressive end of the electorate does not come back to Labour. It disappears. That distinction matters, and it is why Labour’s current posture of deliberate distance from Opportunity is shortsighted even on pure electoral arithmetic. Assuming a wasted vote of around 5% to 6% from sub-threshold parties, Labour’s 34% gives them roughly 43 to 44 seats. At 37%, the figure rises to around 46.
The bottom line
Wong is not Winston Peters. Not yet and possibly not ever. The kingmaker model requires structural conditions that take years to build. What Wong has a serious campaign apparatus, and a political environment that is more favourable to a third-force insurgency than New Zealand has seen in a long time.
Whether that is enough to get to 5% in November is uncertain. Whether it is enough to be a kingmaker is a different question, and the answer is no, not this cycle.
The interesting question is what happens if Wong wins Mt Albert, holds 3% to 4% of the party vote, and ends up as a one-seat outlier in a parliament where the left bloc needs every bit of help it can get. That is not kingmaker territory. But it is leverage of a different kind. And it would set the party up for 2029 in a way that nothing else could.
That might be the play. If it is, it is worth being honest that it is a 2029 play, not a 2026 one.
*Natalia Albert is a political scientist living in Wellington exploring how to govern divided societies in diverse, liberal democracies, with a focus on New Zealand politics. She writes weekly on her Substack, Less Certain. Albert stood as a TOP candidate in the 2023 election.
44 Comments
The framing they use for this is “teal.” They describe themselves explicitly as centrist, bridging Labour and the Greens on environment and National on the economy. The pitch to voters is a version of “keep Labour honest on the economy, keep National honest on the environment, keep the extremes out of Cabinet.”
I think they'd have a good chance if they ditched their tax policy. They have said in the past even if they were kingmaker they would be unlikely to be able to implement it with either major party anyway. So why persue with it?
A sensible party with a likeable female leader that can bridge the gap between National and Labour is a big tick for way more than 5% of voters.
A party that wants to tax the crap out of anyone who owns a house, now that's a different story. They are only left with voters who don't own a house, don't want to own a house, and want the economy to tank. <5% I'm guessing.
They propose a land tax, and the citizen's income would offset much of that unless you own a particularly expensive piece of land.
That said, getting either of the main parties to agree to that??
According to AI:
Key Pillars of the Tax Reset
- Citizen's Income (UBI): A $19,400 annual ($370+ weekly) tax-free payment to every adult citizen or permanent resident, replacing most existing benefits.
- Land Value Tax (LVT): A 1.75% tax on urban land value and 0.5% on rural land, designed to lower house prices and reduce land banking.
- Income Tax Reform: A simplified, tiered structure is planned:
- 28% for income up to \(\$50,000\).
- 34% for income between \(\$50,001\)
- and \(\$200,000\).39% for income over \(\$200,000\).
- KiwiSaver 2.0: A new compulsory superannuation system with a 12% total contribution rate (6% employee, 6% employer) phased in over eight years.
How are they going to pay for it? I just did the sums, we own an above average piece of land and have above average incomes, and even we would end up better off if those numbers are correct. I guess there are enough people with multiple properties to sting.
I still think it will freak home owners out even if they would end up better off. The hard part will be getting that message out there.
Good to see you actually doing the math there Jim. Too many I speak to do nothing of the sort, yet say they'd be worse off.
There's not enough information in Jimbo's post to make any calculation valid. Are they cancelling rates and replacing it with the LVT? is just one question.
Why tax this way? Do they understand how money works these days?
My understanding is that rates stay as status quo, and the focus of their proposals is to try at ,least, to dampen the impending costs being lumped onto future generations, remove incentive for land banking and property investment into more productive areas, deconstruct the benefit system, and be better off for working NZ'ers to better allow the prospect of having services available in the long term such as the existence of a pension, reasonable healthcare, and somewhat of a small bit extra in cashflow to have a family if one wished.
So more tax if you own a home then, higher costs there then.
Looking at Jimbo's other data, apart from the tax free threshold, 28% tax upto 50K. that's less than the median income now. 34% up to 200K that's an increase in tax right there for people on middle incomes. They're the group who are struggling now.
What am I missing?
I'll run some math, and anyone please correct any mistakes as it's a learning exercise of course.
So everyone would get paid $19,400 tax-free regardless. Jobseeker benefit is currently for a single person at $372.55/wk or $19372.6/annum and is taxed, so whether someone is employed or not they get universal support and benefit from lack of tax on the payment.
Current tax regime:
10.5% for income up to $15,600
- Total to be taxed in bracket: $15,600
- TAX $2,340
17.5% for income from $15,601 - $53,500 = TAX $6,632.32
- Total to be taxed in bracket: $37,899
- TAX $6,632.32
30% for income from $53,501 to $78,100 = TAX $7,379.7
- Total to be taxed in bracket: $24,599
- TAX $7,379.70
33% for income from $78,101 to $180,000 = TAX $33,626.67
- Total to be taxed in bracket: $101,899
- TAX $33,626.67
39% for all income over $180,000
Let's look at say an income of $100k for an example:
Current Tax Regime
Total PAYE tax for $100k earnings = Sum of $2,340 + $6,632.32 + $7,379.70 + $7,226.67 ([100k-78,101] x 0.33)
Total tax curently: $23,578.69/annum (notwithstanding the ACC levies not included but leaving these out for simplicity)
Proposed regime under TOP:
Tax on:
50k = $14,000
other 50k = $17,000
Total PAYE: $31,000
Difference: $7,421.31 so this means you'd pay more tax. However if you add in the $19,400 tax-free then said person is now $11,978.69 better off.
If this person owned a home with say a land value of 400k. Cost of LVT = $7,000/annum so they are still $4,978.69 better off than the current tax regime.
ALSO
Minimum wage currently is $23.95/hr which over a 40hr week equates to $49,816/annum or $7,105.80 PAYE tax, however add in the tax free $19,400 and they too are better off.
Again, happy to be corrected here if my numbers are off, but hope this is somehow helpful.
Extrapolating it looks like the cut off point is $115,000 income if you own a house and $150,000 if you don't.
Because they are going to have to print a lot of money to finance it and the inflation rate is going to be epic?
How are they going to pay for it?
Yes, the folks with multiple properties are one source of new money (although I do wonder if many landlords will try to raise rents accordingly) but I suspect the even bigger cohort of new money will be from pensioners who own their own homes. I did the calc and our LVT would be a greater amount than our rates. Pensioners can defer the tax however until the asset is sold (whether by themselves or their estate).
You would have to be extreme land-rich and income-poor to be worse off under the proposed changes.
Yes it seems that way, I'll take it all back. The hard part will be getting that message out there.
The $370+ weekly is somewhat misleading as the tax free income threshold has gone. People on low income will get that $370 but also pay more tax on their income. And if all other benefits are gone (e.g. WFF and childcare?), maybe they end up worse off.
If that land tax comes in, land value will drop significantly. So even though people who own a house may be better off income wise, they could lose a lot of money from their house.
How do retirees pay for it?
It does differ from traditional NZ policies by not gold-plating the retiree experience.
https://www.opportunity.org.nz/tax-reset
"Some ‘asset rich, cash poor’ Kiwis (like older New Zealanders and farmers) will be incentivised to make different choices under the Tax Reset. For example, a retired couple could reduce their tax bill by downsizing their home or shifting into renting (freeing up that home for the next generation). A farmer may choose to plant marginal farmland into native forest (for a tax cut), invest in more productive land-uses or sell part of their farm to a young farmer. To ensure retirees and farmers are supported through the decade-long Tax Reset transition, lower rates, deferrals and exemptions are included in the policy.
People who own a large property portfolio or are landbanking will see lower profits, and be incentivised to invest their money in more productive sectors of the economy."
I think this is what makes their tax policy impossible. Neither Labour nor National will form a coalition which makes almost every retiree poorer. So why bother? They'd need to get like 50% of the vote for the tax reset to have any chance.
I guess there could be a progressive approach agreed upon. For example the land tax starts at 0.25% and goes up by 0.25% every 5 years. That would give people time to plan accordingly.
Well the major share of retirees may not be around to vote in 15years. What then will parties do to win votes if their key demographic is shrinking? The ways of the past can't continue forever in line with old thinking. Eventually they'll be having to target the millennials who will be the next biggest voting cohort.
Wonder how Iwi landowners feel about the policy.
Big assumptions you're making there. I own my house, I'm a very high income-earner. I think their tax policies are sensible and will be voting for them, again.
2.5% of people think the same way as you, but they need 5%.
Perhaps that's just the percentage of the country who 1./ vote in what they believe in and 2./ dismiss nonsense such as the wasted vote thought process vs so many many others
Why do we need a kingmaker?
A smart move might be support for confidence and supply with the largest party, and then support for whoever is prepared to come closest to TOP's policy agenda.
The public might be rather keener on that than a party locked into an opaque contract at the start of a term, in a world where things can change very fast.
In that way they might actually achieve something, for their policies are so broad that they would require full control of the treasury benches to implement them - and there is no prospect of that at the moment.
As the author explains WP has really been the only kingmaker and that is WP not NZF. If this coalition government is returned it is difficult to imagine WP still being active next time in 2029. That may mean in return that this 2026 election is the last one that requires an actual kingmaker. Instead the parties on offer may arrange themselves as being just the reliable coalition partners as described in this column. Which in an inverse sense would revert the electorate to either vote for National plus or Labour plus.
It would be very easy for a party to be kingmaker right now, they just need to be centre and not Labour or National. The likes of United Future would do well in this election.
But no party wants to fill that void, they all want their own little agenda that normal people find difficult to vote for. WP's agenda is handing out free money to old people, that gives him enough votes, but it also limits his possibilities.
IMO It's very hard to shake the wasted vote issue given generations have grown up being told this by their parents so it is culturally and behaviourally embedded, and nowhere near enough voters actually read policy statements, let alone have robust and respectful debates and discussions about politics as it tends to be a topic many avoid for fear of conflict. All the better reason to start these discussions with your peers and get people thinking.
When MMP was first introduced the arrival of the Greens gave some real indication of a party with a recognised and important platform that would thus develop in parliament to be of an influential size. That same platform would have been available to either of the major parties as being worthwhile. Unfortunately it did not come to be. Instead the Green mantle was hijacked into extreme left wing policies that even Labour has refused to accommodate formally in government, in cabinet. That is a great pity because that was the kernel that would have seen MMP functioning properly in NZ rather than the assembly of bits and pieces to get the requisite number of votes.Although to be fair there is now a government working with two coalition partners each with sizeable representation.
Mt Albert is a weird electorate to stand in too. I doubt many voters there want a 1.75% land value tax. She should probably choose an electorate where the land has very little value.
Unfortunately, an electorate like that will be full of lower socio-economic voters that would not have TOP on their radar (if they bother to vote at all).
Said voters tend to be disconnected (from the media and political messages) and fighting day to day to survive. Their electorates get hi-jacked by fringe/extreme parties. Think Te Pati Maori (TPM), Brian Tamaki Party (BTP), Winston Peters Party (NZF).
At the end of June 2025, 406,128 people were receiving a main benefit. This was up 25,239 or 6.6 percent when compared to June 2024. The proportion of the working-age population receiving a main benefit increased to 12.5 percent, up 0.6 percentage points from June 2024.
I assume those numbers have got worse since last year.
Seems to me the place to campaign with pamphlets/handouts is outside WINZ offices.
Nearly every beneficiary would not only be better off financially but psychologically and socially - as no longer would they need to report to WINZ. A huge burden taken off them. It would be so good as in this difficult environment for finding work - the first thing these people want is work and the last thing they want is having to report just how many applications they have made and how so very few of those result in even hearing back from employers, let alone result in an interview.
I don't think most NZers not in this situation realise how bad mentally, the current system is, for the unemployed. And the frustration and depression often leads to substance abuse and petty crime.
If I were Opportunity - I'd be directly pointing this out to the wider electorate. To my mind (and I'd be worse off financially) their Citizen's Income is the SINGLE issue that will see me casting a vote for them. I have grandchildren and life just should not be so hard and uncertain for them - and that goes for those with higher education too. Being young and inexperienced in today's world is an absolute curse.
Wake up New Zealand and stop voting your own pocket. Everyone who has something in that pocket should be thankful for that and aware that many have nothing in theirs.
And PS - NZF/Winston Peters gives me the impression he doesn't give a rats ass about youth issues. Same the Nats and same for Act.
A question i would be asking is what role does political history play in contemporary elections when most of the electorate either have no personal experience of the not too distant past or were born offshore.
The demographic being described are essentially boomers + and i believe that demographic is no longer the largest voting block.
Agreed. They do all vote though, even from their wheelchairs and walking frames. If voting age youth actually get off their Iphones and vote...change will happen.
If TOP can get 5% and become a kingmaker their Tax policy's will make for a big turnaround for NZs future. All they need is a bigger turn out in under 35s NZ who have low turnout crack that and they will canter in. Running away to Straya or the UK is looking less and less fun every day.
Land Tax, will it be the final Ponzi torpedo...
They won't be kingmaker with that policy. They even said last time that they are unlikely to get either major party to agree with it.
Why would it help under 35s? Houses won't be more affordable. They will be cheaper, but then you have to pay the land tax.
True but it really helps NZ.
The tax is collected and actually spent in NZ. Currently that money is funneled to the Global Banking Cartel offshore owners via the Australian banks. Keep more of the money here, which funds low level stuff. Stuff like teachers, nurses, police, roads, hospitals, medicine etc etc.
Remember however, that Tax is simply a mechanism of deleting created money, it isn't kept in a pot somewhere to be re-spent.
Well over creation of money, aka printing and electronic created debt by the Banks, is really the heart of the inflationary mess we find ourselves in today.
Not real... Last teacher, cop, doctor I saw and the roads I drove on all seemed quite real.
They are...but not paid for with tax.
Houses won't be more affordable. They will be cheaper, but then you have to pay the land tax.
Cheaper usually means more affordable Jim, unless I misinterpreted the dictionary. Cheaper housing would equate to lower weekly costs to service a mortgage coupled with the UBI would likely leave them better off than today, and with a greater chance to own a home if that is their wish.
No, if increase cost of ownership in an inelastic low demand market (NZ housing circa 2026) the resulting fall in price won't compensate enough to make housing more affordable, because there is insufficient stock to meet future increased demand.
Really. TOP is also interested in a more focused immigration policy. Aka "meaningfull skilled workers". Not dissimilar to act wanting less low wage no English skjlls types.
I don't see a vote for Opportunity as a wasted vote.
I won't vote for Labour while they are so gutless and lacking any vision, and I see the current coalition as dangerously damaging to the future of NZ with their relentlessly short term focus.
I see a vote for Labour as a wasted vote, because it wastes the chance to make things better.
I'm a boomer with above average value property so I may well pay more but I value investing in NZ to improve things for my kids. Many of my other investments are in areas where future start-ups are being gutted by the government cuts to science, pure research and education.
Opportunity policies won't be implemented directly, but I think of them as a catalyst where a small amount of influence can generate a better contest of ideas, particularly if they don't enter into any coalition agreement.
And if they get closer to 5% it will give people more confidence in 2029.
I totally agree. My circumstances are similar. I will be voting Opportunity.
Given their tax and UBI won't ever make it through negotiations, it will be interesting if closer to the date they will list out their must-have policies to support either of the duopoly
Can see the left doing anything to get back into power. See what happens.
There will never be another Winston Peters.
Agree. Love him or not, his political instinct is above and beyond most
Agree. Love him or not, his political instinct is above and beyond most
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