Once again, we have an interesting insight into polling. Â
Yesterday we told you about the poll results from TOP and their numbers in Ilam. Â
Ilam is a blue seat in Christchurch. It was held for years by Gerry Brownlee until the Covid upheaval three years ago when Sarah Pallett, who never thought in a million years she would win it, won it. Â
Raf Manji, who is TOP's leader, did what Gareth Morgan should have done previously and is standing in a local seat with the outside chance of winning it, thus avoiding the 5% threshold of MMP, which they were never going to get to. Â
The reality is, despite that, they aren't going to get to it this time. If I was giving advice, I would genuinely look at how they present themselves. Â
I watched an interview with Raf a week or so back and was bewildered by what he was saying as regards teal visas. At the end of the interview I could not work out who they were, what they stood for and who they would align to by way of a major party. Â
Yesterday, according to his Raf Manji's own party's polling, which to be fair polled a seriously larger number of punters than this morning's Taxpayers Union Curia poll, was behind the National candidate Hamish Campbell. But not by much. Â
And the Curia poll confirms it. Or does it? Â
That is the problem we are starting to see already this campaign - are the polls even slightly accurate? Has polling become too hard? Â
Are there too many people, allegedly, undecided? Â
In the Taxpayers' poll Manji, who was a close second in his own poll, is a distant third in this one, behind even the Labour candidate. Â
If you take out the undecided's he is an even more of a distant third. Â
In other words, who's poll do you believe? Â
The margin of so-called era is out the door, out the window and it’s a picture of two completely separate races. Â
As I say, I don’t think TOP have a chance, either in Ilam or at 5%. But what they wanted from their poll is the sense they were genuine contenders. Â
And that is the danger of  polls - who do you believe? How much do they affect the narrative and are they actually accurate, or just a vehicle for spin?
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