Foundation The Opportunities Party was founded by economist and philanthropist
Gareth Morgan in November 2016. Morgan launched the party on 4 November outside Parliament House in Wellington. On 10 January 2017 the party announced that it had 2,000 members and was applying for registration. It also announced that it was considering standing electorate candidates. The Electoral Commission posted notice of the registration application on 21 January. The party announced that then party chief of staff
Geoff Simmons would contest the
Mount Albert by-election on 25 February 2017. During the by-election the party was criticised by
David Seymour for offering free bus trips for Mount Albert voters, which he asserted breached the Electoral Act. However, the
Electoral Commission cleared TOP of any wrongdoing. Simmons received 623 votes (4.56% of the total vote), placing him third.
2017 general election The party was registered by the
Electoral Commission on 6 March 2017. On 24 May 2017, Gareth Morgan announced the party's first four electoral and list candidates for the
general election on 23 September 2017, and announced further candidates in the following months including former
Green Party candidate Teresa Moore who joined Geoff Simmons as co-deputy leader.
TOP's final list had 26 party list candidates of which 21 were also contesting electorates. TOP took
TVNZ to court after being excluded from its televised election debates, but lost the case. Leader Gareth Morgan faced controversy during the campaign for referring to Labour leader
Jacinda Ardern as "
lipstick on a pig", suggesting that the new leader had style but not substance. Morgan also faced backlash when he criticised the public for being sad over the death of Jacinda Ardern's cat. This backlash included an email from TOP candidate Jenny Condie, who said, "It is not merely Gareth's comments themselves – these are a reflection of the culture that exists within the party. There is a mismatch between our policies and our culture: between what we say we want to accomplish and how we actually behave." In response, Morgan told Condie to resign from the party. At the
2017 general election, TOP gained 2.4% of the vote and won no seats in the
New Zealand House of Representatives. Morgan vowed to continue fighting for a "fairer New Zealand" and maintained that TOP was not a failure since it was the fifth most popular party.
Post election developments In December 2017, three months after the election, Gareth Morgan resigned as leader and the party's deputy leader Geoff Simmons and two candidates also stepped down from their roles. Morgan said the party would contest the 2020 election but he would not lead it. In the week that followed the resignations, candidates
Jessica Hammond Doube and Jenny Condie announced the launching of a splinter group from TOP with the placeholder name "Next Big Thing". Both candidates attributed their low list rankings to their having raised questions over Morgan's controversial remarks during the election campaign. Condie would become a councillor for Wellington in 2019, while Jessica Hammond would return to TOP for the 2020 election, after a culture shift within the party during its rebuilding phase. On 9 July 2018, Morgan announced that the Board of The Opportunities Party had decided to cancel the party's registration since the party lacked the time and resources to contest the 2020 general election. In late July, Morgan and the party's board announced that he would reconsider his decision to cancel the party's registration after receiving expressions of interest from people sympathetic to the party's goals. Morgan also indicated in a
Facebook post that he was willing to fund candidates and leaders sympathetic to the goals of The Opportunities Party. In August 2018, The Opportunities Party appointed a new board and Geoff Simmons was appointed interim leader. The new team embarked on a "Listening Tour" across the country to gauge supporter reaction and future interest. In December 2018, an
internal leadership election was run by digital voting company Horizon State. The candidates for leader were Geoff Simmons,
Donna Pokere-Phillips, Amy Stevens, Anthony Singh, and
Jessica Hammond-Doube. An election was also held for the member-representative to the Board. On 8 December 2018, the board announced that
Geoff Simmons had been elected and that Donna Pokere-Phillips had won the race for Member Representative.
2020 general election After gathering enough support to restart the party and continuing to register with the Electorate Commission, a rebrand and relaunch was held in October 2019. In the brand launch speech, leader
Geoff Simmons called for a universal basic income and advances in environment and housing, and to "break the Labour / National duopoly". TOP nominated
candidates in multiple electorates. The
Ōhāriu electorate was a particular focus: their Ōhāriu candidate Jessica Hammond Doube said that TOP intended to pour resources into that campaign, as it was the only seat that the party believed it could win. However, she lost the seat to incumbent representative
Greg O'Connor by 18,494 votes. Receiving 4,443 votes herself, she came third. Simmons himself contested
Rongotai and came fourth with 3,387 electorate votes out of 45,649 cast. At the beginning of his campaign for the seat Simmons spelled the name of the electorate incorrectly in his advertising as "Rongatai". The party won 43,449 party votes in the election, or 1.5% of the total. During the party's AGM held on 3 November 2020, the first after the preliminary results had been released, Geoff Simmons resigned as leader and
Shai Navot became interim leader. On 27 January 2022, former Christchurch City Councillor and independent candidate for
Ilam,
Raf Manji, was announced as the party's third leader.
2022 local elections The party fielded four candidates in the 2022 local elections, the first time they had contested them. With the final votes tallied, the party had its first elected representative in John Dennison who won a seat on the Featherston Community Board in the
South Wairarapa District.
2023 general election As of May 2023, TOP averaged around 1–2% in opinion polls. Its leader, Raf Manji, said that realistically it would need to win the
electorate of Ilam to enter Parliament. Manji had contested the electorate in 2017, as an independent, and came second. Manji said, "Essentially, you've got a backbench MP from Labour, or backbench MP from National, or the former city councillor for the ward who knows the issues". On 4 August 2023, TOP announced their new party list where they put forward 13 electorate candidates throughout New Zealand. On the same day,
Natalia Albert was announced as the new Deputy Leader of the party. During the 2023 general election held on 14 October, TOP received 2.22% of the party vote. It failed to win any seats or meet the five percent threshold needed to enter Parliament. Manji came second in Ilam, with 10,863 votes compared to the winner
National candidate
Hamish Campbell's 18,693 votes. During the party's Annual General Meeting on 3 December 2023, Manji stepped down as leader. In August 2025 the party's general manager, former Labour MP and minister
Iain Lees-Galloway, advertised the role as party leader on employment website
SEEK.
2026 general election In November 2025 the party chose Qiulae 'Q' Wong to be their new leader. Wong currently works at
KPMG, is the former director of the New Zealand branch of
B-Lab, and also worked for the Ethical Fashion Forum in London, as well as New Zealand accessibility initiative Be.Accessible. On 13 February 2026, Wong announced that the party would campaign on replacing all forms of welfare assistance including
superannuation with a means-tested "citizen's income." Unlike
universal basic income, people earning more than NZ$350,000 a year would not be able to access it. The citizen's income policy would be funded by a land value tax, and savings from the benefits that would be replaced. On 16 February, general manager
Iain Lees-Galloway announced that the party would run candidates in 30 electorates. Wong confirmed she would contest the
Mount Albert electorate. During the party's State of the Nation address in Auckland on 21 February, Wong announced that the Opportunity Party would campaign on promoting national unity, banning
bottom trawling and investing in renewal energy. The state of the nation address was attended by representatives from several environmentalist NGOs including the
Environmental Defence Society,
World Wildlife Fund,
Greenpeace Aotearoa New Zealand,
Forest & Bird, Legasea, Ma Tatou, Pure Advantage, the Sustainable Business Network and the Aotearoa Circle; which had boycotted the annual
National Party-Blue Greens forum. ==Electoral results==