Still fairly early days

The Herald reports:

Mr Cunliffe, who has struggled to match the modest poll showings by his predecessor David Shearer, said it was “still fairly early days” and “this is going to bounce right back again”. “The only poll that counts is the one on election day,” he said.

There are 117 days until the election. David Cunliffe became leader 253 days ago. Not sure how you call that early days.

Patrick Gower blogs:

David Cunliffe needs to walk into Labour’s “war-room” right now and re-name it “the panic station”.

Labour’s big fear right now will be its vote collapsing completely.

Labour will be worried that voters decide it can’t win – and instead vote for New Zealand First, the Greens or just stay at home.

Last night’s 3 News/Reid Research poll has National on 50.3 percent and Labour on 29.5 percent.

John Key was on 43.2 percent and Cunliffe 9.8 percent as preferred Prime Minister

Scorelines of 50-29 and 43-9 – on the rugby pitch, that’s what you call a thrashing.

In our first poll of the year, Cunliffe could have been Prime Minister. Now he is polling worse than David Shearer is when Labour threw him out.

Labour is suddenly in serious strife.

Let’s look at how things were in 2002, 2005 and 2008, four months before an election.

In 2008 National was 18% ahead of Labour four months out, and John Key was at 38% for Preferred Prime Minister.

In 2005 National was at 39%, just 5% behind Labour four months out. Don Brash was at 20% for Preferred Prime Minister

Interesting in 2002, National was at 32% four months out from the 2002 election. Bill English was at 14% for Preferred Prime Minister.

There is the potential for the Greens and/or NZ First to do very well this election.