Back in July, in what seemed a fairly off-the-cuff move at a press conference, National Party leader Christopher Luxon ruled out working with Opportunity in a coalition after the election.
He’s been peppered ever since with questions about whether he'd change his mind, and many wonder what the reality of that is. Would he actually pick up the phone after November 7 if required.
The question is now repeatedly coming up in his meetings, not just from journalists, but those in the public too, including at his visit to Pongakawa yesterday.
And for good reason too.
In the latest 1News Verian poll, National had a big jump - moving up four points to 32%. But even with that rise, the coalition is on 60 seats, still about three short of a majority (assuming Te Pāti Māori wins electorates and causes a four seat overhang on the left).
By ruling out Qiulae Wong's Opportunity, Luxon would not only put the left back into power, he would also doom his own job prospects because he simply couldn't lose the election as National leader and stay on.
After all we haven't had a one term government since Norman Kirk in the 1970s.
While Luxon has repeatedly said no to the idea of working with Opportunity, he’s ducked questions on whether he'd take Wong's phone call if it came on November 8.
He also declined to put his own job on the line in the Stuff leaders debate on Tuesday night.
But even if Luxon was to flip, he's not the only one that would need to move.
David Seymour is the likeliest to be convinced. He’s on the record at public meetings with a message to lock out Labour and would work with Opportunity if he had to do that.
That leaves a wily old character called Winston Peters.
At the TVNZ multi-party debate, when asked by host Tova O'Brien who he could work with Peters said, the parties in government now, implying National and ACT. It was a quiet rule out of Opportunity of sorts.
In recent weeks when asked about if he'd consider working with Opportunity, Peters has instead reverted to saying he doesn't believe the party will make it to the 5% threshold needed to get into Parliament.
But his firmest position yet came after last night’s Herald power-brokers debate.
When asked if he could sit around a cabinet table with Wong, Peters said: "No, I can't."
A history of flip-flopping
While Peters has a history of flip-flopping on who he goes with between the left and right, he has for the most part gone into an election campaign being clear about who is on the table and who is not (there could be some dispute about 1996).
He has repeatedly ruled out working with Labour since 2022 and that position has not changed.
Therefore, him similarly ruling out Opportunity is not something to be sniffed at.
Across the fence, Wong's chances of going with Peters appear to be pretty slim.
She's already ruled him out as Foreign Minister, but potentially far more significant is that her entire campaign is based on being everything that Peters isn't.
Her argument that Peters has been the common denominator in the majority of governments over the past 40 years in last night’s debate could be described as partially false.
He's only been in them for 12 of those years.
But Peters has decided four elections, three of them where he’s gone into coalition.
For Wong to do a deal with Peters, it would mean returning New Zealand First to the Beehive offices, despite telling voters throughout the campaign that his politics is about taking the country backwards and not forwards.
So, the Peters-Wong dynamic may ultimately be more significant than whether Luxon is being totally up front on his stance towards working with Opportunity.
Luxon might u-turn, but if Peters stays firm, there’d be no deal to be done.
SHARE ME