A harsh word on discipline, outlining priorities and playing nice with coalition partners are likely all on the cards for National's annual summer retreat, ahead of their inaugural year in office.

Party officials have headed to Christchurch for team building and catching up. According to Herald deputy political editor Thomas Coughlan, the get-together will provide the perfect chance for party leader and Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon to lay down the law.

As Coughlan explained, while the retreat is largely behind closed doors a little bit is understood about what will take place.

"MPs have been on holidays for a bit - they've been seeing families and haven't seen each other since Christmas, so they do a bit of team building to kick off the political year," the deputy editor said.

"National has got a whole lot of new MPs who haven't been to parliament before, so I believe Luxon will be giving them the hard word about expectations - they're going to be given a good talking to about not getting into trouble because that's the last thing you want a large new caucus like this to get into."

Coughlan said Luxon's corporate background will serve him well in conversations with his party members about maintaining standards that reflect the party.

"Anybody who's been in parliament for any length of time can see - and we've seen this week with Golriz Ghahraman - you don't want silly little mistakes or big mistakes in that case, to get in the way of your political agendas," he said.

"And all it takes is one MP to make one mistake and all of a sudden, your whole government's derailed."

Coughlan expects Luxon will provide key messaging around sticking to the straight and narrow path, ensuring the actions of one or two individuals don't let the party and wider coalition partnership down.

Aside from discipline, the Government has promised to complete a series of political chess moves within its first 100 days in office - policies they're keen to either introduce or repeal or key appointments and job firings that need to be made.

Government objectives are another expected topic during the retreat.

"It's possibly less about developing new policies as it is talking about the ones already on the table that the Government's going to rock through this year," said Coughlan.

“We've got this 100-day plan that the Government wants to get through; because we've had such a long break, we're now about halfway through that 100-day plan so they've not got a lot of time to tick those off.

"The caucus is probably going to get a talking to about what the priorities are in that 100-day plan and when that ends, what happens next."

Asked if things grow complicated trying to get the caucus singing from the same songsheet when a coalition is involved, Coughlan agreed.

Labour, he said, has often been elected without the need to form coalitions so at the few caucus retreats he’d attended with the party, it was "certainly easier".

However, Coughlan said, being an MP means growing familiar with not having everything your way.

"I have been told one of the things they're talking about this time around is just how you should behave in a coalition Government," he told Summer Breakfast.

"Obviously, you're allowed your own political identity, to say 'this is our National policy and this is Act or NZ First's policy', but there's probably an expectation you don't snipe too much and fire too much at your coalition partners."

Coughlan said while parties won't agree on everything, it's not a great look when the coalition is constantly squabbling.

"So there will be a bit of chat about that and just how to behave yourself - because it is a funny arrangement where you're both mostly on the same team in the same Government, but not completely."