However, its new leader Qiulae Wong is adamant that 2026 is the year that Opportumity breaks the glass ceiling and returns its first MPs.
‘‘Our average polling across all polls is better than it’s ever been this far out from an election,’’ Ms Wong, who has spent the past few days campaigning in Dunedin, said.
‘‘We’ve had a couple of polls at 4%, Talbot Mills at 3.2%, and even the Taxpayers’ Union, in which usually we don’t do as well, has us at 2.6%, which was up 0.7% from the month before.
‘‘We’ve never been in that strong of a position this far out, but we’ve still got a bit of time to go.’’
Opportunity has history against it. Since MMP was introduced almost all new parties have found 5% of the party vote too high a bar to clear, and the best Opportunity has achieved was 2.4% in 2017, when its high-profile founder Gareth Morgan was leader.
‘‘I probably look and sound a bit different from the former previous official leaders,’’ Ms Wong said.
‘‘Historically we have had male economists who are the traditional Opportunities policy nerds, and I come from a very different background, so I think that even just that, even a different face and look for the party will help to reach a different voter base.
‘‘I think we’ve really narrowed down who our core voters are beyond that, and it is essentially a lot of people like me who are young, urban, professional parents that are worried about their kids’ futures and know that we need to do things differently.’’
Opportunity has unashamedly attempted to walk in the footsteps of the Teal movement in Australia, which has blended conservative and progressive policies to construct a centrist policy base.
In its bid to claim New Zealand’s electoral middle ground it has recruited from both ends of the political spectrum: former Labour cabinet minister Iain Lees-Galloway is Opportunity’s general manager and former National minister Jackie Blue is an adviser to Ms Wong.
‘‘We think that the Left-Right spectrum is a bit outdated; it doesn’t accurately represent politics today, but it’s a bit hard to go into that detail when you’re trying to explain positioning, so that’s why we rely on saying centrist,’’ Ms Wong said.
‘‘It is very fragmented, and all we can do is be really clear on what our values are and what we see as the future for New Zealand that we want to champion, and that’s what people will hopefully buy into.’’
