The Prime Minister this morning faces his first National caucus meeting since a bombshell poll, showing the party is at risk of losing a substantial number of seats in Parliament. 

Christopher Luxon has said he will “absolutely not” resign the leadership, and expressed confidence he is not about to be rolled by MPs concerned about their future prospects in a party that has bled support since the 2023 election. 

Today will mark the first National caucus meeting at Parliament since Friday’s Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll. Luxon would have seen some members at the Monday Cabinet meeting. 

Caucus meetings are held every Tuesday morning in sitting weeks. 

Speaking on Monday, Luxon said the poll results had been raised “in passing” during conversations with MPs over the weekend. 

“I talk to my ministers and MPs all the time. In passing, I talked about the poll result. I talked about lots of other things,” Luxon said, stressing “it hasn’t been a major focus”. 

He acknowledged the difficulty of last week, which included his now-infamous comment suggesting “any action” to stop Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon would be a “good thing”. 

The Prime Minister admitted the next day he had misspoken. 

“There is no perfect week in politics,” Luxon said yesterday. 

“Last week wasn’t the perfect week. It is not surprising I’d raise that or talk [about] that in passing. But only in passing.” 

Luxon said he didn’t expect to hear about the poll results from his MPs at today’s meeting. He said the caucus was “unified”. 

“We have got a lot on our caucus agenda. We talk about lots of different things. 

“We have got a pretty straight-up culture inside our team that Nicola [Willis] and I have built since we took over as leaders and we talk about a range of different things.” 

His focus was “building a great team and actually getting things delivered and done”. 

“I am not a career politician. I am not going to have the perfect soundbite. I can reassure you, the one thing I can guarantee you going forward from here, there won’t be perfect soundbites either. 

“That is because I am not a creature of this place and been here 20 years.” 

The Prime Minister and Finance Minister fronted a press conference on Monday afternoon. Photo / Mark Mitchell 

Luxon said some previous prime ministers had been “fantastic communicators but don’t deliver”. 

“New Zealanders are over that and they just want me to get on with the job, and that’s what I am doing.” 

The Herald revealed on Friday that the National Party had sunk to its lowest point on this poll since Luxon took the leadership in late 2021. 

The results showed National on 28.4%, only a few points higher than its disastrous 25.58% at the 2020 election. 

If converted into seats in the House, National would lose 12 seats. At the election, it held 48 but would only get 36 on these poll results. 

Luxon’s net favourability had fallen three points to –19%, which was behind Labour leader Chris Hipkins on –5%. Chris Bishop and Erica Stanford, two National MPs often discussed as replacements for Luxon, were on –14% and –16% respectively. 

As often happens after poll results are released, National MPs entering Parliament today will be met by media, questioning their confidence in the current leader and expectations going forward. 

While ministers were at the Beehive on Monday for a Cabinet meeting, most backbench MPs don’t usually arrive until Tuesday morning, before the House sits in the afternoon. Some politicians were around the precinct on Monday for select committee meetings. 

Just before 10am, MPs will leave their offices to head to the National Party caucus room on the first floor of Parliament. 

Ministers will head across the bridge from the Beehive into Parliament House, where reporters will be waiting with questions. 

Later in the day, after the caucus meeting, ministers will again speak to reporters on their way into the House. 

The Prime Minister usually skips this and uses another route to get around media. 

Jamie Ensor is the NZ Herald’s chief political reporter, based in the press gallery at Parliament. He was previously a TV reporter and digital producer in the Newshub press gallery office. He was a finalist in 2025 for Political Journalist of the Year at the Voyager Media Awards.