By Duncan Garner
The National Party still holds a commanding lead in our latest 3 News Reid Research Poll, just 13 days out from polling day.
If National polls like this on election night it will govern alone and the Labour Party will be looking for a new leader.
Looking at the numbers, National is up 1 percent to 53.3 and Labour slips ever so slightly to 29.9.
The Green Party go past 10 for the first time ever in our poll.
Winston Peters' NZ First is on 2.4 and a long way still from the 5 percent they need.
The Maori Party is at 1.4, Mana 1.0 and could almost get a second MP through.
ACT has collapsed; Don Brash has taken them backwards
Peter Dunne is on zero and now struggling to even hold his seat.
• Live updates from the election campaign – click here
For the preferred Prime Minister, John Key is back to 50 and for the first time Labour’s Phil Goff is past 10, moving up to 12.4.
So it is National which is still miles ahead and Mr Key is pushing the message to his team and to National voters not to be complacent and to be careful.
The two Johns are banking on their ‘cuppa’ to help form a centre-right government. And they are hoping it leaves Mr Goff sipping his luke warm cuppa all on his own.
But on tonight's poll Mr Key did not need to meet a desperate John Banks. At 53 percent National has 66 seats and could govern alone.
“It’s a good result but there's a lot of work to be done in the next two weeks,” says Mr Key. “Voters will kick the tyres in the next two weeks and work out what sort of government they want."
Labour is on 29.9 - if it polls that on election night it will lose a number of current MPs and be in opposition.
Mr Goff has been targeting Labour's traditional voters this weekend. He has fired all his shots and they do not appear to have worked. Now he is just hoping National's popularity collapses.
“A lot of people make up their minds at the last moment, a week is a long time in politics,” says Mr Goff.
And it's happened before. Helen Clark shed 10 points from 50 to 40 in the last two weeks of the 2002 election. Mr Key certainly understands that.
“What I know is that people's vote is personal, and like world cups they are hard to win, and if you blink it passes you by."
We also asked voters how they thought the leaders are performing.
Mr Key sheds a bit amongst those who say he is performing well, and down a bit amongst those who say he is performing poorly.
And for Mr Goff, some better news. He is up amongst those who say he is doing well and down significantly amongst those who say he is performing poorly.
3 News