The latest Newshub-Reid Research results come as no surprise for a political commentator, with the recent Labour scandals sending the party in a downward spiral.
The results, which were revealed on Wednesday night, showed Labour down 3.6 points to 32.3 percent, while National was up 1.3 points to 36.6 percent.
The smaller parties had a big moment, with ACT sitting at 12.1 percent, up 1.3 points, the Greens at 9.6 percent, up 1.5 points, while New Zealand First is on the charge, up 1.1 points to 4.1 percent.
The results mean National and ACT can comfortably form a Government in October's election, getting 63 seats, while the left-bloc of Labour-Greens-Te Pāti Māori could only reach 57 based on the Newshub-Reid Research results.
Political commentator and former MP Peter Dunne told AM Early on Thursday the results come as no surprise, given what Labour has had to deal with lately.
"I think it's locking in a trend that's been developing over the last two or three months of the gap between the centre-left and the centre-right starting to become clear and become more and more established," he said.
"I think recent events have made that even more definite, so it's a hard road to home for Labour from here on in with just a few weeks to go until the election, [it's] pretty difficult to see this being turned around."
Labour has been in the headlines throughout 2023, but a lot of the time, it's for the wrong reasons.
Stuart Nash was sacked from Cabinet for leaking confidential information to donors, Meka Whaitiri defected from Labour for Te Pāti Māori, Michael Wood resigned over his shares scandal, and Kiri Allan stepped down after allegedly crashing her car and being arrested.
"There's no question that would've played a role in the minds of voters," Prime Minister Chris Hipkins told Newshub.
"We've had a bumpy ride as a team over the last few months. I’m absolutely confident that's going to end."
But one saving grace for Labour is Hipkins popularity, which isn't falling.
The results show 24 percent of respondents chose Hipkins as their preferred Prime Minister, which is up 0.6 percent while National Party leader Christopher Luxon is at just 15.9 percent, down 0.5 percent.
While the results aren't pretty reading for Luxon, Dunne doesn't believe National will be worried, as the party is well in front of Labour.
"Yes, in the sense Luxon should be doing better than he is. But no, in the sense that given the overall state of the parties, Luxon's personal support is almost irrelevant," he said.
"In any case, if he becomes Prime Minister, that carries its own certain weight and you'd find he'd go up in the polls quite significantly."
One interesting result in the preferred Prime Minister poll was ACT leader David Seymour getting support from 10.9 percent of respondents, up 3.4 points. So he's breathing down the neck of Luxon.
Dunne believes this will cause a different type of coalition after this year's election, with ACT being a much strong player numerically, which will change the dynamic of the Government.
The latest results won't be what Labour had hoped for, but Dunne believes it's not the end of the road for them.
He told AM Early they could start to gain momentum once they truly get into the campaign swing.
"Labour hasn't been campaigning much. It's been too busy focusing on being the Government and once it starts to roll out its policies, it may well attract some of that support back, although, with some of the stuff that's come out in recent weeks, like the justice announcement a couple of weeks ago, the leak about GST on fruit and vegetables last week, things haven't gone entirely in their favour, so it's still going to be an uphill battle," he said.
Watch the full interview with Peter Dunne in the video above.
