Has National Lost Its Centre-Right Secret Sauce?

Roger Partridge, Chair and Senior Fellow of the New Zealand Initiative, discusses global trends away from centre-right politics ahead of a tight New Zealand election, tracing a populist shift since the 2008 financial crisis that hollowed out traditional centre-right parties in the US, UK, Germany and France.

Partridge argues New Zealand bucked this trend for a decade under John Key and Bill English, who delivered genuine centre-right reform (tax changes, welfare overhaul, privatisation, fiscal discipline) that voters felt and rewarded with repeated strong election results. He contrasts this with the current National-led government under Christopher Luxon, which he says lacks clear convictions, has allowed debt and deficits to balloon, avoided asset sales despite an infrastructure shortfall, and campaigned against big business - adding that National's negative "no new taxes" slogan reflects a party that has "lost the recipe" compared with its more confident predecessors.

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