Outgoing National MP Vanessa Weenink and sacked National MP Chris Penk say National's gone way too far to the right. They're losing voters because they've gone too hard. Voters who deserted National and ticked the box for Act say I don't think so. National's too soft and centrist, needs to find a backbone. That's why we went away from two ticks blue and we gave our vote to Act.

That's certainly what a number of people have been telling me. Voters on the left have said thanks but no thanks to Labour and gone with the Greens or Opportunity. Both main parties in New Zealand appear to have lost their identities and in their struggle to capture the voters in the middle, generally considered to be around 20 to 30% of the electorate, they have lost their authentic selves, as a wellness influencer might say. They don't know who they are anymore. They might say one thing and then do another, which leaves voters feeling confused.

If anybody thinks that Labour is the party for the working class, it really isn't anymore. There'll be some people who voted Labour just because they always have and because it's slightly more for the working class than National, but not that much more. Labour's kind of lost its way, National's lost its way.

They're not alone. Major legacy parties around the world are struggling. The Tony Blair Institute did some research and found that the popularity of traditional centre left and centre right parties across major democratic countries have plummeted from 73% in 2000 to just 51% today. Researchers looked at the views of samples of 2,000 voters that were polled in the UK, US, Australia, Germany, France, and Canada and found they were remarkably similar.

They concluded that voters were increasingly turning away from centre left and centre right parties, according to this piece in the Guardian, not for ideological reasons, but because confidence in their competence and integrity have plummeted.

Former politician Richard Prebble argues that both Chrises need to go before the parties can begin attracting their faithful back to the fold.

Both Christophers have run very bad campaigns, but it's worse than that. You've got to listen to the country, and the country has been telling them for three years that they don't want either of them to be Prime Minister. At some point you have to listen.

That was Richard Prebble talking to Mike Hosking this morning on the Mike Hosking Breakfast. He's not wrong.  The polls have had National and Labour down for quite some time. Everybody's been underwhelmed by the performance of both National and Labour. But is it as simple as putting lipstick on a pig? Because a dysfunctional party that doesn't know its why or for whom it exists is still a dysfunctional party that doesn't know its why, even with a shiny new leader.

Would simply changing out the leader bring you back to the party you used to vote for? What would it take for either National or Labour to earn your vote?

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