RNZ poll: Most voters want super age to stay at 65

National will face an uphill battle convincing people to lift the superannuation age, with most voters opposed to the idea, according to the latest RNZ-Reid Research poll.

In contrast, the survey found overwhelming support for the party's plan to make KiwiSaver compulsory, but that largely evaporated when paired with a higher pension age.

National's Nicola Willis reignited the superannuation debate at this year's Budget, highlighting Treasury's forecasts that the cost will balloon to more than $30 billion a year by 2030. She said any party that ignored the size of the problem was doing so for its own benefit.

But asked for their view, a clear majority of poll respondents - 58 percent - said they wanted the age of eligibility to remain at 65.

That compared to 35.3 percent who said it should be increased to 67, while another 6.8 percent were unsure.

Superannuation

The opposition to increasing the pension age was consistent across most party supporters, with only ACT and Opportunity voters more in favour than against.

National supporters were evenly split on the issue with 47.8 percent in support of an increase, and 48.2 percent opposed.

Labour and Green voters were the most resistant - with only 25 percent and 19 percent respectively in favour of an age hike.

Curiously, a third of New Zealand First voters wanted to increase the age of eligibility, despite the party's long-held opposition to any change.

And a sizeable 44.6 percent of Te Pāti Māori voters - a party which wants to see a lower age for Māori due to lower life expectancies - supported a hike.

Neither National nor ACT have yet to announce detailed superannuation policies for this election, but both campaigned to increase the age to 67 during previous elections.

Labour, the Greens and New Zealand First all support the status quo.

Means-testing

The electorate appears much more open to the prospect of means-testing the pension as a way of bringing down its cost.

Asked whether the government should introduce means-testing so higher income or wealthy retirees received less or no government pension, 46.6 percent of voters said yes, while 40.7 percent were opposed.

The rest - 12.7 percent - said they did not know.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins briefly flirted with the idea of means-testing superannuation during an interview in April, saying his party was "open" to a bipartisan conversation.

However, he quickly walked that back, and in June, the party ruled out any changes to the pension settings if elected.

KiwiSaver changes

Voters are very keen on National's policy to make the KiwiSaver saving scheme compulsory for all workers from July 2028.

A whopping 70.4 percent supported the move, while only 20.2 percent did not.

The lowest support came from Green voters - at 51.8 percent - still more than half the party's supporters.

The party unveiled the policy at its annual conference in June, along with a $1500 kickstart payment for newborns and government contributions for those on parental leave.

The policy is similar to New Zealand First's, which would make enrolment compulsory at birth and offer a contribution of $1000 for New Zealand citizens only - alongside compulsory enrolment for the wider workforce.

The overwhelming support shown in the poll, however, collapsed when it was paired with a higher pension age, as National is likely to campaign on.

The RNZ-Reid Research poll asked voters if they supported a combined package that both made KiwiSaver compulsory and increased the age of super eligibility to 67.

More than half said no - at 52 percent - while only 37.6 percent said yes.

National, ACT and Opportunity voters were most in support of the combined package, with more than half their voters saying yes.

Labour, Greens, New Zealand First and Te Pāti Māori voters felt differently with a majority from each party being opposed to the idea.

This poll of 1000 people was conducted by Reid Research, using quota sampling and weighting to ensure representative cross section by age, gender and geography. The poll was conducted through online interviews between 2-9 July 2026 and has a maximum margin of error of +/- 3.1 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.