A Green Party video that mocked National leader Simon Bridges' accent has been pulled after drawing heavy criticism online.
The ad was pulled just two hours after being uploaded to Twitter this afternoon.
“That's the way politics is going,” deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters said of the Green Party’s ad aimed at the National leader.
"To our supporters: we heard you, and we’ve deleted the post and apologise for causing offence," the party has tweeted.
The ad came after the National leader attacked the Government's recent announcements on electric vehicles.
"Come on down to Simon's Imports and check out these low, low prices that I've got on these climate friendly cars! Prices are down, emissions are down, my polling is down," the ad depicted Mr Bridges saying.
"I found it funny," Mr Bridges said of the video. "Others clearly aren't - we're not a party that said 'we're going to do kindness'."
"I think they're feeling the pressure, we've seen unprecedented attacks this week, the first attack ads from Labour on me and now from the Green Party."
He said National were holding the Government to account on tax, "and they're holding me to account on my accent".
"You've got a change in approach this week, from a Government under pressure."
Before the video was pulled down, Green Party co-leader James Shaw said they thought National's "negative campaigning... is actually unacceptable".
Both Labour and National have recently released attack ads of their own.
The Prime Minister was asked about Labour Party advertisements, one which showed Mr Bridges' interview on RNZ on the interim climate change report.
"Simon Bridges has talked a big game on climate change, but when push comes to shove, he won't back the action that's needed," Labour wrote on Facebook.
It later released a statement titled , "You can't trust National on the environment".
It calls National "out of touch", saying Mr Bridges' track-record on the environment "speaks for itself" and the party had "continually failed to take serious action on climate change".
National had been releasing videos criticising the Government, calling it out of touch, particularly on the electric vehicle proposal.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had not seen the Green Party advertisement, but said each party hold the others to account.
"We're always going to hold each other account, particularly based on the things that we say in the public domain, that doesn't necessarily mean that it's an attack."
"It's not very kind, is it?" Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters said.
"That's the way politics is going."
Mr Peters said he had never pronounced Mr Bridges’ name as ‘Soi-min’.
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