There was not much in the way of hope for Jacinda Ardern in the 1News poll tonight. If replicated on election night, National and ACT could quite easily form a government. The previous poll had them just scrapping in.
The one ray of hope is that support for NZ First is now at 4%, which means we can expect it to hit 5% at least before election year next year. Winston Peters has talked plenty of trash about Labour lately and has even appeared to rule them out. But you'd have to be a complete rube to rely on those kinds of statements.
Nevertheless, even if you added a bit more to NZ First and add it to the government column it would not be enough. National would still have the edge.
And this is before the country is plunged into a recession being purposefully engineered byt he Reserve Bank governor. Who was just re-appointed by Labour.
All to control inflation that the government has helped to cause which stands ready to eclipse wage increases. Including with cuts to fuel tax and greater subsidization of public transport, both of which are due to expire next month.
Still, on its face, the polling deficit of the government would not seem insurmountable. You might even be surprised that they are not doing worse than they are now. But a government does not need to trail by much to lose control of the narrative.
New Zealanders are increasingly miserable. And it's not hard to see why.
The decline in house prices have parts of Twitter cheering but put a tight squeeze on the mortgage belt. There's no compensating benefit, however, because even the reduced prices are not affordable by those who have squeezed by the market. And that's if they can even borrow the money - which, of course, they increasingly can't.
Centralizing the bureaucracy has done nothing to visibly improve healthcare. It was always a strange priority to have, but people are justifiably angry as they languish in hospital waiting rooms. All Andrew Little seems able to do is blame the governments of the past while promising a never ending series of reviews.
We can argue about the overall numbers. What is beyond argument, however, is the effect on our national psyche of the crime that is happening. It is more brazen and it is often quite gruesome. Nerves are frayed.
What remains of its legislative agenda will not help. The 3 Waters reform has been bungled in conception, messaging and delivery from day one. It's proposal to merge RNZ and TVNZ is desperately unpopular.
Jacinda Ardern, so passive in the cannabis referendum, has at last found a cause to stick her neck out on. The problem is that it is giving 16-year-olds the vote. This is even even less popular than prisoners' having the right to vote.
All of which adds up to a pretty bad perception. The government is distracted from the real issues. Even if it were not, however, it feels like there is little it would be able to do to fix matters - beside commissioning more reviews.
There is plenty of time until the next election. That means there will be many opportunities for National and ACT to foul things up. But the headwinds Labour is now facing are serious indeed.