New Zealand First opened its 2026 election campaign in Auckland this weekend, with leader Winston Peters using the party’s annual conference to pitch for an unprecedented second consecutive term in government and to argue the coming vote is the most important the party has faced.
Peters told members and candidates the campaign was about “the rebuilding of real hope and real opportunity” for New Zealanders, and framed the election as a moment the party could not afford to waste. “It’s one of those elections where it’s now or never,” he said, according to RNZ.
The launch comes as New Zealand First sits on its strongest polling in nearly a decade. The party reached 11.5 percent in the latest RNZ-Reid Research poll, its third consecutive rise in that survey and its best result since 2017. On those numbers the party would return around 15 MPs, a substantial lift on its current standing and enough to keep it central to any coalition arithmetic after the election.
Peters leaned into that position at the conference, casting his party as a settled part of government rather than a protest vote. “We’re in the room properly, and we’ve never been far from ordinary New Zealanders’ concerns and thoughts,” he told the gathering.
The party set out the platform it intends to take into the campaign. New Zealand First wants to restrict voting rights to New Zealand citizens only, a change from the current rule that lets permanent residents vote once they have lived in the country long enough to qualify. It also wants to automatically enrol every newborn New Zealand citizen in KiwiSaver with a $1000 government contribution, buy back the Bank of New Zealand, and split up the big electricity companies that both generate and sell power.
Those policies place New Zealand First at the populist and economic-nationalist end of the current coalition, and at several points over the weekend the party drew clear lines between itself and its partners. Peters was sharply critical of the free trade agreement with India, calling it “too generous” to India on immigration and “discriminatory” on trade. The comments underline a tension inside the government, with New Zealand First opposing a deal its coalition colleagues have championed.
Deputy leader Shane Jones took a harder line on identity and migration, positioning New Zealand First as a “nationalist” party and arguing that prioritising New Zealanders was not racist but a reflection of the party’s values, 1News reported. Jones has been one of the party’s most combative figures this term, and his framing set the tone for a conference that leaned heavily on national identity, sovereignty and control over immigration.
The launch also showcased a run of former MPs who have crossed to New Zealand First from other parties. Former National MPs Harete Hipango-Brownlie, Alfred Ngaro and Michael Laws have signed on as candidates, alongside former Labour minister Stuart Nash and former All Blacks captain Taine Randell. Several of the former National members said they had moved because of concerns about the direction of their old party, pointing to what they described as demographic engineering and the influence of globalist thinking on mainstream politics.
The recruitment drive is part of a wider bet by Peters that a slice of disaffected National voters is up for grabs. National has slid to its lowest level of support since Christopher Luxon became leader, falling to 28.7 percent in the same poll, its fourth consecutive decline. Labour leads on 34 percent, and the minor Opportunity Party has climbed to within a fraction of the 5 percent threshold, adding to the uncertainty about how the numbers will fall on election night.
For Peters, a second term in a row would be a first. New Zealand First has been in government three times but has never managed to return immediately after a full term, losing its seats in 2008 and again in 2020. Holding on this time would cement the party’s run as one of the most durable forces in modern New Zealand politics, and would keep Peters, now 81, at the centre of government well past the age most politicians step away.
The conference set the shape of the contest to come. New Zealand First will campaign as the disciplined and experienced partner inside the coalition while running hard on immigration, national identity and economic control, and it will do so from a stronger polling base than it has enjoyed in years. Whether that base holds through a long campaign, or softens as the larger parties sharpen their attacks, is the question that will decide how much leverage Peters carries into the next round of coalition talks.
Voters weighing up where the parties stand before polling day can compare their own views with the parties’ positions using Newswire’s voting tool.
What do you make of New Zealand First’s campaign launch and its pitch for a second term? Have your say in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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