Tuesday’s ballot<\/a> would put things to rest. While he was successful, the prime minister refused to take questions about it afterwards or say if it was unanimous.<\/p>\nAsked on Morning Report if he should have been warned ahead of the vote, the NZ First leader said: “It would have been wise to yes, of course.”<\/p>\n
“In plain ambit of human relations and cooperation, the answer is of course, yes.”<\/p>\n
Peters, whose parliamentary career began in the 1970s, said it was an “unprecedented” move from a sitting prime minister, and not one he supported.<\/p>\n
“Because you see, you can tell when the next one’s going to happen. Not initiated by himself, but by others, and just wait for the next round of polls. And that’s the sad thing.<\/p>\n
“I mean, this is unprecedented… there are going to be consequences. They’re seriously predictable consequences. But what I was astonished by was that they didn’t seem to understand, sadly, what they were doing. And here we are, part of the coalition, where stability of government all the way to the 2026 election and beyond is the critical component. And this is not helpful.”<\/p>\n
![\"Finance](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/4JQHN0Q_Image_17_jfif.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
\nFinance Minister Nicola Willis says markets have reacted positively to the ceasefire news, with crude oil prices falling and global equities up, at a press conference on 8 April 2026.
\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone\n<\/p>\n
Asked if he was essentially telling the National Party – which unlike NZ First, has been sliding in the polls – to get its act together, Peters said: “Well, you’ve phrased it that way, but I don’t disagree with you.”<\/p>\n
Peters said a leadership spill would not have voided the NZ First-National coalition agreement, but that it would need to be “reshaped” – and warned National MPs against trying it again.<\/p>\n
“You don’t sit here with all your responsibilities without looking at possible scenarios playing out and looking at every alternative. And if it’s like an octopus, the decision-making conclusion’s like an octopus with eight legs – you better understand all eight possible legs, not just three of them, five of them\u2026 You’ve got too many people with too little experience giving their views about what the outcome should be. That’s tragic.<\/p>\n
“And I can go back to a former time when leadership lasted far longer because parties realised, ‘Hang on, we’ve got to this point, we have to stay solid with our first decisions rather than changing like a yo-yo,’ which you’ve seen in New Zealand in recent times.”<\/p>\n
Peters said it was important the government get back to the basics of governing “as fast as possible”.<\/p>\n
“Our job is to provide stability for the New Zealand people who are fighting petrol price rises, fuel price, supermarket, power pricing. That’s what New Zealanders are concerned about.”<\/p>\n
‘You weren’t in the room’<\/p>\n
National deputy leader and Finance Minister Nicola Willis told Morning Report while she did not know who voted for or against Luxon, the vibe was that the vote was emphatic.<\/p>\n
“I was in the room and the caucus was extremely clear that what we want to do is focus on serving New Zealanders, that we have no time for anonymous mentions in the media leading to speculation.<\/p>\n
“The prime minister himself called for a vote of confidence to affirm that support for his leadership. The result was very clear. It was by majority. and we have a very firm caucus position, which is once the caucus takes a position, we all back it 100 percent, one for all, all for one.<\/p>\n
“We don’t know the result of the vote. We never do. That’s not how we do things in the National Party. I was in the room and I think there was extremely strong support for that motion.”<\/p>\n
Asked how she could know for sure the vote for Luxon was strong, Willis said: “I know a lot more about it than you do. You weren’t in the room.”<\/p>\n
Asked about Peters’ comments earlier, Willis said he was “mischief-making” and suggested a vote for NZ First was possibly a vote for a Labour-led government.<\/p>\n
“Winston Peters has a track record of picking Labour over National, and that’s the risk you run with him.”<\/p>\n
Peters, originally a National MP, since forming NZ First has sided with National twice (1996 and 2023, both formal coalitions) and Labour twice (2005 as part of a confidence-and-supply agreement and 2017 in a formal coalition).<\/p>\n
Labour’s Tangi Utikere said the vote was “classic” National Party stuff: “infighting amongst themselves, weak leadership from Prime Minister Chris Hipkins – not Chris Hipkins, he’s going to be the next prime minister, but Christopher Luxon over this issue, really, really disappointing”.<\/p>\n
“And people expect, actually, the government to be focusing on the issues that really matter to them – jobs, health, homes, real action on the cost of living in an affordable New Zealand, rather than squabbling amongst themselves in what is clearly a circus at the moment.”<\/p>\n
Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero, a daily newsletter<\/a> curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo: RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone https:\/\/www.rnz.co.nz\/national\/programmes\/morningreport\/audio\/2019031954\/winston-peters-on-the-consequences-of-luxon-s-confidence-vote Winston Peters says he should have been warned ahead of Christopher Luxon’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":391031,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45],"class_list":{"0":"post-391030","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-podcasts","15":"tag-public-radio","16":"tag-radio-new-zealand","17":"tag-rnz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391030","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=391030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/391031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=391030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=391030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=391030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Christopher](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/4KYF8NG_231206_14_jpg.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n