NZ First wants to limit NZ Super to citizens only from 2029
New Zealand First has pledged to restrict New Zealand Superannuation to citizens only from 2029 if elected, with leader Winston Peters announcing the policy at a public meeting in Hamilton on Sunday.
Peters said the change was driven by concerns about the affordability of NZ Super, according to RNZ. The party's own website, published on 5 September, confirms the announcement that from 2029 only New Zealand citizens will be eligible for NZ Superannuation (NZ First).
The policy includes a three-year transition period before citizenship becomes a requirement for receiving NZ Super from 2029, as reported by Waatea News. Under current rules, you must be 65 or older to receive NZ Super, and permanent residents are eligible if they have lived in New Zealand for 10 to 20 years (depending on date of birth) from age 20, including five years from age 50 (1News; RNZ).
NZ First has also announced a companion policy: by 2029, only citizens would be allowed to vote in New Zealand elections (NZ First; NZ First). The party frames the superannuation restriction and the voting restriction as linked parts of a broader platform tying entitlements to citizenship.
The policy has drawn strong reactions from migrant community advocates. Sophie Liu, an Auckland resident originally from China who has been in New Zealand for more than a decade and meets citizenship requirements, told RNZ she was shocked to learn of the policy. Kelly Feng, chief executive of Asian Family Services, described it as unfair and inhumane. Vishal Rishi, chief executive of Asian Network Incorporated, said NZ First's earlier pledge to restrict voting to citizens suggested such migrants would be left only with "the right to contribute" (RNZ).
RNZ and 1News both reported the policy in early September, with RNZ confirming NZ First's pledge to restrict Superannuation to citizens from 2029, and 1News reporting that only citizens would be eligible under the campaign policy.
The broader context here is that NZ Super is a universal pension paid to everyone who meets the age and residency requirements, regardless of income or work history. It is not means-tested, meaning your earnings or savings do not affect whether you qualify. Tying eligibility to citizenship rather than permanent residency would be a fundamental shift away from a residency-based model that has applied under successive governments. The practical effect would fall on permanent residents who have met the existing 10-to-20-year residency threshold but have not taken up citizenship — a group that includes long-term migrants who may meet all other qualifying conditions.
Pairing the superannuation policy with a voting restriction sharpens the stakes. Permanent residents currently hold the right to vote in general elections under existing electoral law. Removing both the vote and pension eligibility from non-citizens would concentrate civic and economic participation rights on citizenship status alone, a framing that distinguishes NZ First's platform from the cross-party consensus that has treated permanent residency as a sufficient basis for both.
Whether the policy gains traction will depend on coalition dynamics after the election. NZ First has positioned the citizenship requirement as an affordability measure, but the fiscal argument has not yet been tested against Treasury modelling or costed against the proportion of Super recipients who are permanent residents rather than citizens. What is clear is that the party is putting forward a coherent package: citizenship as the gateway to both democratic participation and retirement income, with a 2029 implementation date and a transition period built in.
