(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Most people in New Zealand support the opposition National party, according to a poll by Colmar Brunton released by One News. 51 per cent of respondents would vote for the conservative political organization in this year’s election to the House of Representatives, down one point since July.

The governing Labour party is second with 37 per cent, followed by the Greens with 3.5 per cent, the Maori Party with 3.1 per cent, New Zealand First with 2.6 per cent, United Future with 0.7 per cent, and ACT with 0.6 per cent.

Labour leader Helen Clark has acted as New Zealand’s prime minister since December 1999. In November 2006, Don Brash—who had served as National’s leader since October 2003—announced his resignation and was substituted by finance spokesman John Key.

On Aug. 19, Key met with Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd for the first time. National’s leader claimed he will maintain the current status of New Zealand-Australia economic relations if his party comes to power later this year, declaring, "I said to Mr. Rudd that we view the further development of the single economic market on a bi-partisan basis and if there was a change of government in New Zealand then he could expect us to continue that work."

The next election is expected to take place in September 2008.

Polling Data

Thinking about the Party Vote, which is for a political party, which political party would you vote for?

Source: Colmar Brunton / One News
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,000 New Zealand voters, conducted from Aug. 9 to Aug. 14, 2008. Margin of error is 3.1 per cent.

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