Unless you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of Kiwis living in Australia, you might not know that NZ is holding an election this weekend.
Last time the country went to the polls, it resulted in a coalition government headed by Christopher Luxon’s right-wing party National.
This time round, Luxon and National are facing off against the Labour Opposition, led by former PM Chris Hipkins, and many minor parties.
Here’s what’s going on across the ditch.
Context
NZ last went to the polls in October 2023.
Luxon’s National party won the most seats in the country’s one house of Parliament, with 48.
But National needed support from smaller parties to form government.
After 41 days of negotiations, it reached a coalition agreement with two other right-wing parties: ACT and NZ First.
As part of the deal, ACT leader David Seymour and NZ First leader Winston Peters agreed to share the deputy PM role, swapping halfway through the parliamentary term.
Parties
National, ACT and NZ First are now competing against each other, although all three have left the door open to working together again if needed to form a majority.
A recent poll by national broadcaster RNZ found almost one in five people who voted for National in 2023 had since switched their support to ACT or NZ First.
Meanwhile, Labour has signalled it is open to working with the Green Party and Te Pāti Māori (the Māori Party) to form a government.
Te Pāti Māori and the Greens have also left the door open to working with other parties.
There’s also the centrist party Opportunity, which has rebranded and elected a new leader ahead of this election.
It too is open to working with other parties, although it is considering ruling out a coalition with NZ First.
The positions of all these parties matter because of how New Zealand’s Parliament and voting system work.
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ContributeVoting
Voters make two choices on their ballots: the candidate they want to represent their electorate, and a political party.
Their preferred candidate doesn’t need to be from the same party they nominate in the other category.
The two parts of the ballot correspond to the two ways parties can win seats in Parliament.
Either: At least 5% of people choose them on the party side of their ballot, or
Their candidate wins an electorate seat.
There are other possibilities, but they’re a bit too complex to get into here.
Put simply, how voters split their votes across the ballot paper can lead to some unexpected combinations of parties in Parliament.
One more thing to know: the number of seats in Parliament can be adjusted based on how many electorates a party wins and its percentage of the party vote.
The extra seats are called an overhang.
ACT and NZ First have backed a campaign calling on voters to split their votes in order to create an overhang.
Under that plan, voters would make sure National gets electorate seats, but by voting for ACT and NZ First on the party side, they would increase their representation in Parliament and “keep the left out”.
Issues
The cost of living and inflation are the top concerns for New Zealand voters, according to Ipsos polling.
Inflation rose by 3.7% in the year to September 2026, up from 3% the previous year.
Bloomberg analysis found bread prices have risen 57% over the past three years, while milk is up 30%.
Healthcare is another major election issue, with understaffing, long waits for specialists and surgery, and difficulties accessing cancer treatment among the problems facing the system.
