The case for an early election

(Image: Getty)

Wed, 29 Mar 2023

Conventional wisdom has it that the public punishes governments that call early elections. Robert Muldoon’s 1984 snap election was a disaster for the National party.Helen Clark damn near took Labour to defeat when she went early, in July 2002, having been polling a commanding 55% support in the polls at the time that she called it.These two local examples tend to form the slender reed on which the presumption is based that current prime minister Chris Hipkins would be mad to call an early election this year.That presumption is most likely...

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