Opinion: The winners and losers in National’s new line up

Christopher Luxon and Nicola Willis.

Christopher Luxon has revealed his promotions and demotions in his new National Party line up, while also allocating and stripping portfolios. 1News’ Anna Whyte and Irra Lee take a look at who won and lost in the reshuffle.

The winners

Erica Stanford took a flying leap from 25th up to seventh, Matt Doocey from 20th to eight and Simeon Brown from 19th to ninth.

Luxon put this down to Stanford, Doocey, and Brown’s work on immigration, mental health and gang issues respectively. Despite the praise, Brown lost his police and corrections portfolios in favour of transport and public service.

"I don’t imagine it’s easy to manage a caucus where you have three past leaders within it," she said.

Even though he was deputy for Collins, Shane Reti stayed in the top row at number five – with his work during the pandemic that included getting on the frontline and vaccinating locals in rural Northland and his performance over the Collins-Bridges saga likely saving him from falling further.

Barbara Kuriger saw a slight rise to 10th from 14th, showing up as the first farming voice, while Chris Bishop sat snug up at fourth.

Simon Bridges is quite obviously one of the biggest winners, flipping from losing all his portfolios only a week and a half ago, to clutching finance at number three.

Simon Bridges in November 2021

The losers

She didn't fall off the top 20, but Judith Collins teeters on the edge at 19th. When asked about Collins, Luxon said the party “would use all the talents of everybody in our caucus”.

“Judith has a real passion for the portfolio she’s been given,” he said, referring to her research, science and technology role.

MPs that saw a rise during Collins' leadership, such as Andrew Bayly and Michael Woodhouse fell down with her – Bayly down from third to 15th and Woodhouse from fourth to 18th.

Todd McClay saw a dramatic tumble from sixth to unranked – sitting with Simon O'Connor, Maureen Pugh and Harete Hipango.

The outliers

Todd Muller – he sits among the unranked, but he's back. Kind of. He reversed his decision to retire at the next election, and said he was "hugely invigorated" after being welcomed back to caucus meetings.

Luxon said the way the unranked MPs were listed was down to experience, with the bottom four the new 2020 MPs. It was an interesting comment to make for someone with the same level of experience in Parliament.

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