The National Party's 90th Annual Conference begins on Saturday 20 June 2026 at the Lower Hutt Event Centre, with a new election policy expected to be announced during the two-day meeting.

The conference runs through Sunday 21 June and will bring together party delegates, MPs and officials at a venue just across the harbour from Wellington — close enough to keep the focus on what the government plans to take to voters. RNZ reported ahead of the conference that a policy announcement would come from the party during the gathering.

Prime Minister and National leader Christopher Luxon will be the main focus of the conference as the party moves into what is effectively the pre-campaign period before the next general election.

Party president Sylvia Wood, who took over from Peter Goodfellow in August 2022, has been clear about her polling target. Speaking at the 2024 conference, Wood set a goal of the mid-40s — a threshold that would, under MMP (our mixed-member proportional voting system), give National the room to negotiate with coalition partners and be less dependent on its current allies. How close the party is tracking to that target will likely matter as the weekend unfolds.

Annual conferences at this stage of an election cycle do two jobs at once. There is internal party business — remits (proposals from members), constitutional matters, and candidate selections. Then there is the public-facing work: signalling what policies the party plans to take forward and energising the membership before the campaign. The expected policy announcement fits that second purpose. When conferences happen this close to an election, they are usually carefully managed, with major announcements timed to get the most media attention over the weekend news cycle.

The Lower Hutt Event Centre, in the Hutt Valley, is a practical choice for a party whose leadership is Wellington-based, and the venue has hosted large political and civic events before. Delegates travelling from around the country will find it a straightforward regional hub.

The broader context here is that the 90th conference is a round-number milestone, but the real substance of the weekend lies in what Luxon and his ministers announce and how Wood reads the room — what the party's members think about their chances as the election approaches.