Only once in the past hundred years has a party formed government after changing leader in an election year, but that was Ardern in 2017

According to conventional wisdom, it’s electoral suicide for political parties to change leaders in an (ordinary) election year. But what about in extraordinary election years? And what about changing leaders twice in the midst of the first global pandemic and recession in a hundred years? When the much-needed rule book is written on this, central to its exposition will be whether Judith Collins, the New Zealand National party’s fifth leader in four years, was able to pull off one of the biggest upsets in the country’s electoral history.

Only once in the past hundred years has a party formed a government after changing its leader in an election year, and that was three years ago in 2017. Confronted with his party in opinion poll freefall, then Labour leader Andrew Little stood aside seven weeks from election day to see if his more publicly popular deputy, Jacinda Ardern, would be able to stem the flow of voters leaving it for the Green party. It was an audacious move, and it paid off.