{"id":338868,"date":"2026-03-20T08:57:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T08:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/338868\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T08:57:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T08:57:08","slug":"election-2026-the-opportunity-party-reveals-candidates-promises-more-on-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/338868\/","title":{"rendered":"Election 2026: The Opportunity Party reveals candidates, promises more on the way"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI was really privileged to have both an urban and rural upbringing and those two styles of living have gone on to shape my career,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Eb is the founder of communications agency Dirt Road Comms and Open Farms, an inaugural open farm day initiative connecting urban-residing New Zealanders with the agriculture sector. <\/p>\n

Eb will stand in the North Auckland electorate of Kaipara ki Mahurangi.<\/p>\n

Kayla Kingdon-Bebb is another headline candidate for TOP this election, standing for Wellington Bays. <\/p>\n

\"KaylaKayla Kingdon-Bebb currently heads the New Zealand branch of the World Wide Fund for Nature. Photo \/ Supplied<\/p>\n

Kingdon-Bebb is currently the chief executive of the World Wide Fund for Nature\u2019s New Zealand branch, and previously served as policy director for the Department of Conservation. <\/p>\n

She envisions TOP as the party disaffected National Party voters can rely on for a consistently centrist view and a strong interest in environmental protection. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Green Party has a lot of great environmental policies, but they aren\u2019t for everybody. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere are a lot of right-leaning voters \u2013 particularly National voters, who look at the track record of this Government, probably our most anti-environment Government ever, and don\u2019t recognise their own party,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Donors seem to be seconding that centrist stance, with the party receiving two large donations from political philanthropists who have traditionally been left- and right-wing respectively. <\/p>\n

TOP received a $50,000 donation<\/a> from Les Mills gym franchise managing director Phillip Mills in January. <\/p>\n

Mills has previously donated similar amounts to Labour and the Green Party. <\/p>\n

Technology entrepreneur Brian Cartmell donated $100,000 to Opportunity in March, and says he contributed to the three coalition parties last year. <\/p>\n

In a statement posted on his website, Cartmell said: \u201cMy view is that the current coalition represents the best available chance of navigating this sea change in a way that preserves New Zealand\u2019s sovereignty, prosperity and independence. <\/p>\n

\u201cA healthy democracy needs parties willing to put forward ideas that the major parties won\u2019t. New ideas enter the political process from the edges, and parties like Opportunity play an important role in making sure that process doesn\u2019t stagnate.\u201d <\/p>\n

TOP has failed to get into Parliament since its first run with leader Gareth Morgan in 2017, receiving just 2.4% of the vote in that election, its best result to date. <\/p>\n

Opportunity\u2019s leader Qiulae Wong is confident this will be the year the party will break the threshold and make it into Parliament. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re starting to see the traction and the momentum that we need. Our polling average is higher than it\u2019s ever been this early on,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Wong hopes TOP can be seen as an alternative to New Zealand First, which has held a strong position in coalition negotiations with both major parties in the past. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think most New Zealanders would rather not see Winston Peters be the one to decide who leads the next Government. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s currently no other party to play that role, I think Opportunity is the credible alternative,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Troy Matich is a political reporter with Newstalk ZB, working from Parliament\u2019s press gallery. She joined NZME in 2025, previously working for RNZ as a producer for Morning Report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI was really privileged to have both an urban and rural upbringing and those two styles of living…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338869,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2246,21323,5903,142656,302,130,111,43,139,4061,69,90,6452,4762,30503,1974,1517,8808,2687,14446,131,223,1961,22974,14047,1533,102,379],"class_list":["post-338868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-2246","tag-candidates","tag-election","tag-electorates","tag-its","tag-more","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-number","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-opportunity","tag-party","tag-promises","tag-record","tag-reveals","tag-running","tag-saying","tag-stand","tag-than","tag-the","tag-this","tag-track","tag-way","tag-will","tag-with","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338868"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338868\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}