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AUCKLAND, 14 Oct: Conservative former businessman Christopher Luxon will be New Zealand\u2019s next prime minister after winning a decisive election victory Saturday.<\/p>\n
People voted for change after six years of a liberal government led for most of that time by Jacinda Ardern.<\/p>\n
The exact makeup of Luxon\u2019s government is still to be determined as ballots continued to be counted.<\/p>\n
Luxon arrived to rapturous applause at an event in Auckland. He was joined on stage by his wife, Amanda, and their children, William and Olivia. He said he was humbled by the victory and couldn\u2019t wait to get stuck in to his new job. He thanked people from across the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have reached for hope and you have voted for change,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Supporters chanted his campaign slogan which promised to get the country \u201cback on track.\u201d<\/p>\n
Outgoing Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, who spent just nine months in the top job after taking over from Ardern in January, told supporters late Saturday he had called Luxon to concede.<\/p>\n
Hipkins said it wasn\u2019t the result he wanted.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I want you to be proud of what we achieved over the last six years,\u201d he told supporters at an event in Wellington.<\/p>\n
Ardern unexpectedly stepped down as prime minister in January, saying she no longer had \u201cenough in the tank\u201d to do the job justice. She won the last election in a landslide, but her popularity waned as people got tired of COVID-19 restrictions and inflation threatened the economy.<\/p>\n
Her departure left Hipkins, 45, to take over as leader. He had previously served as education minister and led the response to the coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n
With most of the vote counted, Luxon\u2019s National Party had about 40% of the vote. Under New Zealand\u2019s proportional voting system, Luxon, 53, is expected to form an alliance with the libertarian ACT Party.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Labour Party that Hipkins leads was getting only a little over 25% of the vote \u2014 about half the proportion it got in the last election under Ardern.<\/p>\n
And in a result that would be particularly stinging for Labour should it lose the seat, National was in a tight race for Ardern\u2019s old electorate seat, Mount Albert. The seat has long been a Labour stronghold and was also held by another former Labour prime minister, Helen Clark.<\/p>\n
The National Party candidate for the seat, Melissa Lee, told The Associated Press she was feeling excited but also nervous about the final result in Mount Albert.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been Labour since 1946. It has been the biggest, safest Labour seat forever,\u201d she said. \u201cIt would be fantastic if we won it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lee said that when she was door-knocking, people had told her they were tired of the current government and were concerned with the state of the economy and the spiraling cost of living.<\/p>\n
David Farrar, a longtime conservative pollster, said there was still a good chance that Labour would end up holding the seat once all the votes were counted. However, he said, his initial impression of voting throughout the country was that it was turning out to be a \u201cbloodbath\u201d for the left.<\/p>\n
Luxon has promised tax cuts for middle-income earners and a crackdown on crime. Hipkins had promised free dental care for people younger than 30 and the removal of sales taxes on fruit and vegetables.<\/p>\n
Also at stake in the election is the government\u2019s relationship with Indigenous Maori. Luxon has promised to axe the Maori Health Authority, which he says creates two separate health systems. Hipkins says he\u2019s proud of such co-governance efforts and has accused Luxon of condoning racism.<\/p>\n
Within days of taking the reins in January, Hipkins found himself dealing with a crisis after deadly floods and then a cyclone hit New Zealand. He quickly jettisoned some of Ardern\u2019s more contentious policies and promised a \u201cback to basics\u201d approach focused on tackling the spiraling cost of living.<\/p>\n
Warm spring weather in the largest city, Auckland, seemed to encourage voters, with queues forming outside some polling places. Early voting before Election Day was lower than in recent elections.<\/p>\n
During a six-week election campaign, both Hipkins and Luxon traveled the country and hammed it up for the cameras.<\/p>\n
Earlier in the week, Luxon, who served as chief executive of both Unilever Canada and Air New Zealand, told an energized crowd in Wellington that he would crack down on gangs.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve gotta tell you, crime is out of control in this country,\u201d Luxon said. \u201cAnd we are going to restore law and order, and we are going to restore personal responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n
Luxon also got cheers when he promised to fix the capital\u2019s gridlocked traffic with a new tunnel project.<\/p>\n
Luxon is relatively new to politics but held his own against the more experienced Hipkins during televised debates, according to political observers. But Luxon also made some gaffes, such as when he was asked in a 1News debate how much he spent each week on food.<\/p>\n
His answer of \u201cabout sixty bucks\u201d (U.S. $36) was ridiculed on social media as showing he was out of touch with the cost of living. (AP)<\/p>\n
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AUCKLAND, 14 Oct: Conservative former businessman Christopher Luxon will be New Zealand\u2019s next prime minister after winning a decisive election victory Saturday. People voted for change after six years of a liberal government led for most of that time by Jacinda Ardern. The exact makeup of Luxon\u2019s government is still to be determined as ballots […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-226206","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226206\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}