Christopher Luxon admits to ‘mistake’ over Hawaii holiday blunder

Opposition leader Christopher Luxon was forced to admit to making a ‘mistake’ after a social media post suggested he was visiting a country town when he was on holiday in Hawaii.

Christopher Luxon at the Beehive in Wellington.

New Zealand opposition leader Christopher Luxon has been forced to admit a “mistake” after a post on his social media account suggested he was visiting a NZ country town when he was actually holidaying in Hawaii.

The National party leader has faced criticism over the post, which showed him meeting “hardworking Kiwis” at a sawmill in Te Puke, and included video of him saying: “Today, I’m in Te Puke, the heart of Kiwifruit country”.

At the time the post was put up, Mr Luxon was taking advantage of parliament’s winter recess for a five day overseas break with his family.

Mr Luxon, who is rising in the polls against Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, on Tuesday was heckled in parliament, with one rival MP greeting him with “Aloha,” and another quipping: “I thought he was in Te Puke.”

In the offending post, Mr Luxon said: “I love getting out into the regions to visit places like Te Puke – meeting hardworking Kiwis, dedicated volunteers and passionate locals who all want to get things moving forward.”

Another post showed Mr Luxon meeting officials at Auckland University when he was on the US holiday island.

The former Air New Zealand CEO admitted to MPs that when the posts were put up he had already left the country. He had visited Te Puke the previous week and Auckland University two weeks earlier.

Admitting he and his team had to “own” the mistake, Mr Luxon said the posts should have been published earlier, and should have been captioned differently “to make clear it was in recent days, not on the day”.

He said his social media team had put up the post but he took responsibility for it.

“We made a mistake and we own up to it, we front it,” he said. “We should have captioned the post differently. That’s what we should have done”.

However Mr Luxon refused to apologise for his holiday, telling NZ TV it came after a “pretty full on seven months,” and he had wanted “to have personal time with my family.” He hadn’t checked his social media accounts during the break, he said.

“The media knew that I was away last week and [National deputy leader] Nicola Willis did all my media engagements for me, and it was well known,” he said.

The blunder is reminiscent of Scott Morrison’s Hawaii moment when he had to cut short a holiday to the Pacific nation during the bushfires of December 2019.

However unlike Mr Morrison, Mr Luxon’s gaffe is unlikely to damage him in the long term.

He is increasingly being seen as the next Prime Minister, with the once unbeatable Jacinda Ardern under rising pressure over inflation, rocketing crime and broken election promises.

Ms Ardern’s Labour Party is now polling at 38.2 per cent while National is at 40.5 per cent. Ms Ardern still leads Mr Luxon as preferred Prime Minister but her rating has dropped to 36.6 per cent, down seven points. Mr Luxon, at 23.9 per cent is lagging the PM but is now National’s most popular leader since Sir Bill English in 2017.

Ms Ardern refused to criticise him over the error, but her deputy, Grant Robertson, accused Mr Luxon of misleading parliament.

“A post that says you’re in Te Puke on a particular day when you’re actually in Hawaii is misleading,” he said.