{"id":632942,"date":"2026-10-17T00:38:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-17T00:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/632942\/"},"modified":"2026-10-17T00:38:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-17T00:38:13","slug":"how-we-rate-our-party-leaders-none-of-them-makes-it-to-5-out-of-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/632942\/","title":{"rendered":"How we rate our party leaders: None of them makes it to 5 out of 10"},"content":{"rendered":"

The party leaders chasing our votes are struggling to cut through, with new data on the public’s rating of them showing no one reaches a five out of ten.<\/p>\n

The next prime minister will almost certainly be either National’s Christopher Luxon or Labour’s Chris Hipkins, but both of them were stuck on just 20% in the latest 1News Verian poll<\/a> preferred prime minister stakes.<\/p>\n

And now Vote Compass<\/a> results on their favourability ratings shows Hipkins, although top among the nine leaders assessed, is on just 4.3. Luxon comes in fifth on 3.6.<\/p>\n

Hipkins is well behind his Labour predecessor Jacinda Ardern’s equivalent rating at her peak, and Luxon is behind Judith Collins who was on 3.7 before crashing to a landslide defeat as National leader in the 2020 election.<\/p>\n

The new findings draw on 136,713 people who participated in 1News Vote Compass between October 4 and 11. They were asked how favourable their opinion of each leader was, on a scale from zero to ten.<\/p>\n

After Hipkins come Green co-leader Chl\u00f6e Swarbrick on 4.0 and Opportunity leader Qiulae Wong on 3.8, followed by NZ First leader Winston Peters on 3.7.<\/p>\n

ACT leader David Seymour follows on 3.4 and Green co-leader Marama Davidson is on 3.3. Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori\u2019s co-leaders have the lowest overall ratings, with Debbie Ngarewa-Packer on 2.1 and Rawiri Waititi on 1.9.<\/p>\n

Where do you stand? Compare your policy views with the parties at 1News.co.nz\/VoteCompass<\/a><\/p>\n

Who appeals to undecided voters?<\/p>\n

Among participants still undecided about their party vote, Hipkins remains first on 4.3.<\/p>\n

Wong moves into second on 4.0, ahead of Swarbrick on 3.8. Peters scores 3.3 and Luxon 3.0.<\/p>\n

However, about a third of undecided participants (34%) answered \u201cdon\u2019t know\u201d when asked to rate Wong. Her average reflects only those who provided a score.<\/p>\n

Across all participants, Wong also has the highest \u201cdon\u2019t know\u201d share of the nine leaders, at about 16%.<\/p>\n

That means her relatively high position sits alongside a substantial group who did not express a view.<\/p>\n

Young and older voters differ<\/p>\n

Swarbrick has the highest average rating among participants aged 18\u201329, at 5.2.<\/p>\n

Hipkins follows on 4.8 and Wong on 4.5. Luxon scores 2.9 among this group.<\/p>\n

\"One<\/p>\n

One of these two will likely get the top job. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

For participants aged 65 and over, Peters leads on 4.6, followed by Luxon on 4.4 and Seymour on 4.3.<\/p>\n

There is also a notable difference between men\u2019s and women\u2019s assessments of the two major-party leaders.<\/p>\n

Women rate Hipkins at 4.6 and Luxon at 3.2. Among men, their averages are much closer: Hipkins scores 3.9 and Luxon is in the lead on 4.0.<\/p>\n

As expected, the leaders get much stronger assessments within their own voter bases.<\/p>\n

Participants intending to vote Labour give Hipkins an average of 7.3. National supporters rate Luxon at 6.9.<\/p>\n

Green supporters give Swarbrick 8.5 and Davidson 7.1, while ACT supporters rate Seymour at 7.9.<\/p>\n

Peters scores 7.8 among NZ First supporters, and Wong receives 7.4 from those intending to vote Opportunity.<\/p>\n

How do the scores compare with previous elections?<\/p>\n

Both major-party leaders have lower numerical scores than in the supplied 2023 comparison, while Peters has a higher one.<\/p>\n

It’s important to note, however, that the question has been re-framed over time. In previous elections, participants were asked, \u201cHow likeable do you find [Leader]?\u201d This year, the question is, \u201cHow favourable is your opinion of [Leader]?\u201d Both use a scale from zero to ten.<\/p>\n

Hipkins received a likeability score of 4.9 in 2023, compared with his favourability score of 4.3 this year. Luxon\u2019s figures are 3.8 and 3.6 respectively.<\/p>\n

Peters scores 3.7 this year, compared with 2.9 on the earlier likeability measure.<\/p>\n

Leaders’ 2023 likeability vs 2026 favourability<\/p>\n

Chris Hipkins – 4.9 vs 4.3<\/p>\n

Christopher Luxon – 3.8 vs 3.6<\/p>\n

Winston Peters – 2.9 vs 3.7<\/p>\n

David Seymour – 3.6 vs 3.4<\/p>\n

Marama Davidson – 3.2 vs 3.3<\/p>\n

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer – 2.7 vs 2.1 <\/p>\n

Rawiri Waititi – 2.5 vs 1.9<\/p>\n

\"Jacinda<\/p>\n

Jacinda Ardern and Judith Collins seen at the first Leaders’ Debate in 2020. (Source: Getty)<\/p>\n

Looking further back, the historical tables supplied for this analysis put Jacinda Ardern\u2019s 2020 likeability score at 6.9.<\/p>\n

Then-National leader Judith Collins scored 3.7 – more than Luxon\u2019s current 3.6.<\/p>\n

Ardern\u2019s rating stands well above the scores recorded for either of today\u2019s major-party leaders, although the different question wording remains a qualification to that comparison.<\/p>\n

Results are based on 136,713 respondents to Vote Compass between October 4 and 11, 2026. Data were weighted to align the sample characteristics with those of the New Zealand adult population on the following characteristics: sex, age, ethnicity, education, and past voting record. A margin of error does not apply to non-probability samples. The modeled error estimate for an average rating in the overall sample is \u00b10.02 points on the 0\u201310 scale, 19 times out of 20. Results based on subsamples of the data should be expected to contain greater error.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The party leaders chasing our votes are struggling to cut through, with new data on the public’s rating…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":632943,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5901,219,111,43,139,69,135,270122,305111],"class_list":["post-632942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-1news-recommends","tag-economy","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-politics","tag-vote-2026","tag-vote-compass-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632942","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=632942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/632943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=632942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=632942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=632942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}