As the 2023 election draws closer Labour is sticking to a tried-and-true campaign team while National's going for something old and something new, writes political editor Jo Moir
After a devastating 2020 election loss the National Party is handing the campaign chair reins over to MP Chris Bishop and bringing former campaign manager Jo de Joux back into the fold.
De Joux and former National Party minister and campaign chair Steven Joyce successfully took the party into power during John Key’s time at the helm.
In 2020, under the leadership of Judith Collins, senior MP and then-deputy leader Gerry Brownlee took over as campaign chair alongside campaign manager Tim Hurdle.
It was a bruising campaign with Labour winning a landslide victory, giving it a single-party majority for the first time in MMP history.
The team behind that historic victory was Cabinet minister Megan Woods and her long-time staffer Hayden Munro.
Munro told Stuff in the aftermath of the 2020 win that Labour had looked at the professional campaign staff model National had used under Joyce and de Joux and purposely replicated it.
“We took that model, and we are quite open about this, from National who had it very successfully under Steven Joyce and Jo de Joux for many years and it was clearly a model that worked,” he said.
National Party leader Christopher Luxon told Newsroom Bishop was his preference for campaign chair.
“That’s a conversation we’re having with our board right now…I just want to get it officially signed off, but that’s where we are,” Luxon said.
Bishop flipped the Labour strong-hold electorate of Hutt South in 2017 only to lose it in the red tidal wave of 2020 to Labour’s Ginny Andersen.
National is getting much of the old crew back together with de Joux’s return.
It comes after Luxon hired Bill English’s former close advisor, Cameron Burrows, as his chief of staff.
Former chief press secretary to Key and English, Julie Ash, has also been back in the building working in the Opposition leader’s office.
Bishop has never run the party’s wider campaign but worked for Joyce during his time in the job and is widely acknowledged across Parliament for his relentless electorate work.
He and his colleague, deputy leader Nicola Willis, were seen as the most likely contenders for campaign chair.
Bishop became the obvious choice though after Simon Bridges’ departure saw Willis pick up the finance portfolio, which will consume much of her time during the campaign.
Over at Labour headquarters, Newsroom understands Woods and Munro will be officially announced chair and manager in the coming weeks.
Munro switched careers following the 2020 campaign when he headed into corporate PR at Wellington-based firm, Capital Government Relations.
He also has a regular Herald on Sunday column, and is expected to take leave from both roles once full-time campaign work begins.
