Source: Health Coalition Aotearoa
Parties on the political left show strongest backing for policies to reduce harm from tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food.
Health Coalition Aotearoa is today releasing the results of its election policy survey (election policy survey), revealing a clear political divide on support for evidence-based measures to reduce harm from tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food, and to protect public policymaking from undue industry influence.
The survey, which was sent to all incumbent political parties ahead of the election, assessed support for Health Coalition Aotearoa’s top prevention priorities.
The findings show strongest support from left-leaning parties for policies that would improve health outcomes, reduce pressure on the health system and boost productivity through prevention. Survey commentary is available in a PHCC Briefing (PHCC Briefing).
“Disappointingly, National and New Zealand First chose neither to complete the survey nor attend our Political Forum on Prevention, held at Parliament in August,” says Health Coalition Aotearoa co-chair Professor Boyd Swinburn, a population nutrition and global health researcher at the University of Auckland.
“This pattern of National, and often other Government Coalition partners, not fronting up to invitations to engage on key policy issues has been observed by multiple organisations seeking policy discussions on health in this pre-election period,” Swinburn says.
The survey was based on priorities identified by Health Coalition Aotearoa’s expert panels as the most evidence-based and cost-effective policies for preventing harm from the commercial determinants of health, as outlined in its Prevention Brief 2026 (Prevention Brief 2026).
“What we’re really looking for is areas of general support across the political spectrum so that effective prevention policies might get advanced and sustained, rather than flip-flopping with every election,” Swinburn says.
The policies receiving the widest support were reinstating the tobacco endgame legislation, restoring the Healthy School Lunches Programme to an optimum design, and strengthening protections against undue industry influence in public policymaking. Support was strongest among the Green Party, Te Pāti Māori and Labour.
The findings also showed broad support among those parties for stronger lobbying rules, improved management of conflicts of interest, and greater transparency in decision-making processes. ACT was the only right-leaning party to respond to the survey and was generally supportive of some tobacco and conflicts of interest measures but unsupportive of most other prevention policies.
Notably, National and New Zealand First did not respond to the survey, leaving voters without direct answers on their positions regarding these priority prevention measures.
Although not included in the survey, The Opportunity Party recently released its Healthy People and Clean Up Politics policies, which are closely aligned with Health Coalition Aotearoa’s priorities.
“Enacting policies is, let’s face it, a lot of work, so if we could see progress on tobacco endgame measures, healthy school lunches and lobbying reform under the next government, that would be fantastic,” says Swinburn.
HCA co-chair Jason Alexander says it is disappointing to see parties steering away from taxes and, to a lesser extent, alcohol law reform, including embedding Te Tiriti in legislation.
“Some parties are shying away from alcohol law reform and taxes on unhealthy commodities, which is disappointing given the substantial evidence of their potential to improve health outcomes and equity.”
Tobacco, alcohol, obesity and unhealthy diets cause about a quarter of healthy years of life lost to preventable death and disability (more than 350,000 disability-adjusted life-years lost every year), with these harms falling inequitably on Māori and Pacific people.
Swinburn says the findings are notable because public support for prevention policies is consistently high across areas such as tobacco control, alcohol harm reduction, healthier food environments and stronger protections against industry influence.