Election Watch: Greens Surge, Polls Tighten

Political commentator Dr Bryce Edwards, director of the Democracy Project, joins Andrew Urquhart to unpack the latest twists less than four weeks out from the election. He notes National's beneficiary drug-testing policy has sparked fierce debate even among figures on the right, while National's new fishing policy may signal a strategic courtship of a prospective coalition partner, The Opportunities Party, despite one outlier poll showing TOP dipping below the threshold.

Dr Edwards highlights the Green Party as the campaign's surprise performer, surging to record polling of around sixteen percent after pivoting away from "woke" culture-war politics toward cost-of-living and economic populism under Chloé Swarbrick. He argues this shift, along with drift from Labour and Te Pāti Māori voters, is winning over New Zealanders despite environmental issues ranking low among voter concerns, while cautioning that National's attacks branding Swarbrick a finance-minister "bogeyman" may be backfiring.

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