It’s election year and the stakes couldn’t be higher, but what three issues will loom largest? Here are our political pundits’ predictions.
Lyric Waiwiri-Smith (politics reporter, The Spinoff)
1. The cost of living will continue its multi-year streak of being the one thing we are constantly thinking about no matter how good/terrible everything else is.
2. Climate change. The Climate Commission’s first risk assessment is due in April, and it might just give us the grim existential reminder that we’re all living on a spinning orb that has been perpetually heating up at an unprecedented rate and we haven’t done enough to curb that.
3. Māori voters. The never-ending Te Pāti Māori sideshow will almost definitely be dragged out for way too long in 2026, and voters will find themselves having a change of heart. That leaves plenty of space for another party to go hard on Māori-specific policies and messaging, or for a whole swathe of the public to abstain from voting because they’ve drunk the Kool-Aid on TPM being the only party deserving of a Māori vote.
Andrew Geddis (law professor, University of Otago)
1. Will the economy rebound fast enough to allow the coalition to claim it was all worth while?
2. Can Te Pāti Māori heal itself enough to be a viable contender come election time?
3. Winston. Not sure how, but he’ll find a way to make it all about him.
Veronica Schmidt (editor, The Spinoff)
1. The economy. We may be turning the corner, but the recovery will take time and the cost of living will continue smashing plenty of people in 2026.
2. Crown-Māori relations. There’s anger and hurt and they’re at a level you can’t sweep under the rug.
3. Healthcare. Any voters’ issues poll will tell you this is high on our worry list, but the solution isn’t straight forward. We may value good healthcare, but how do we pay for it with an ageing population, ushering in a challenging fiscal future?
Annabelle Lee-Mather (producer, RNZ’s Mata, co-host, Gone by Lunchtime)
1. What happens in the Māori seats – TPM have ended the year with the ultimate political cliffhanger.
2. Cost of living – because buying butter is the new smashed avocado.
3. To coup or not to coup – Shakespearean in ambition, Koiwoi in execution and no one knows if it’s fact, fiction or just am-dram.
Toby Manhire (editor-at-large, The Spinoff)
1. Will an economic recovery lock in and if so what form will it take?
2. Which potential coalition circus looks the circusiest and will NZ First creak the door a smidge open to Labour?
3. How will NZ respond to growing pressure from Western friends on China?
Lara Greaves (associate politics professor, Victoria University of Wellington)
1. The cost of living, the economy etc, again.
2. MMP coalition building, so basically a “rule in, rule out” game and parties positioning either the right- or left- flank partners as extreme.
3. Healthcare.
Mihingarangi Forbes (host, RNZ’s Mata, co-host, RNZ’s Saturday Morning)
Should be:
- Health.
- Economic stability and growth.
- Youth development given the demographic projections.
Probs be:
- Who gets to talk on the Waitangi paepae.
- Coalition predictions.
- Use of te reo.
Duncan Greive (founder, The Spinoff)
1. If these really are green shoots or just more compost.
2. Which coalition can land the “of chaos” narrative.
3. Referendum on whether Luxon is too boring and/or cringe to be recommissioned for a second season.
Holly Bennett (managing director, Awhi lobbying firm)
1. Access and equity in healthcare. Politicians are going to have to provide surety for how they are protecting universal healthcare in Aotearoa, while articulating how the state will continue to meet the ever increasing cost of footing the bill for these services.
2. Māori/Crown relations dressed up as “race relations”. I say “race relations” because it is not actually race relations; the Crown is not a race. So long as there are political representatives who push the idea that te Tiriti is between races (it’s not), this matter will remain in the spotlight.
3. Tax. Enough said.
