Wednesday 30 October 2024

Out Of Sympathy.

Unsympathetic Characters: Christopher Luxon should be grateful that his principal opponent, Chris Hipkins, is as out of sympathy with the temper of the times as he is.

CHRIS HIPKINS had both a good week and a bad week. He and his team were able to press home Labour’s attack on the self-destructive behaviour of the Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing, Andrew Bayly. Winston Peters’ mid-week counterattack, however, immediately placed Labour on the defensive.

Hipkins was forced to endure the embarrassment of having to walk-back his description of the public servant at the heart of Peters’ conflict-of-interest claims as a “distant relative” of Ayesha Verrall, Labour’s health spokesperson. As Peters gleefully pointed out, the individual in question was, in fact, Verrall’s sister-in-law.

So, not that distant.

The attack on Bayly, while successful, risked the accusation that Labour was shooting an already wounded fish in a barrel. The walk-back forced upon Hipkins by Peters, by contrast, made the Leader of the Opposition look just a little bit shifty, and a lot foolish.

Even worse, Peters had floated a story calculated to shift the public’s attention away from the controversial actions of NZ First’s Associate Health Minister, Casey Costello, towards the equally controversial possibility that ideologically-driven public servants might be deliberately sabotaging the ministers they are employed to serve.

Peters is entirely justified in querying the failure of the Ministry of Health to alert Costello to the potential conflict-of-interest which Verrall’s sister-in-law had promptly, properly and professionally identified to her employer prior to working alongside the Associate Health Minister.

The Ministry’s failure to adequately brief Costello has placed their employee in an extremely uncomfortable position. Verrall has led the charge in Parliament against Costello’s actions in relation to New Zealand’s long-standing, and hitherto bi-partisan, effort to reduce the population’s consumption of tobacco products. Verrall’s attacks were amplified by the impact of a number of dramatic information leaks. The potential, now, for members of the public, alarmed by Peters’ revelations, to put two and two together, and make five, is considerable.

Peters’ intuitive feel for the sort of story most likely to gel with the mindset of the Coalition’s conservative supporters can only be admired. Justified, or not, there is a widespread conviction on the Right that the Coalition Government’s electoral mandate is not respected by institutions whose acceptance of the majority’s right to govern is essential to the proper functioning of a representative democracy.

The impression left with right-wing New Zealanders, from the way these institutions have conducted themselves since October 2023, is that the victory of the three parties making up the Coalition Government represents a deeply problematic triumph of ideas, attitudes, and policies inimical to the optimal development of Aotearoa-New Zealand.

Public servants, judges, academics, journalists and the liberal clergy are all, rightly or wrongly, perceived to be working against the Government, and doing everything within their power to impede the roll-out of policies deemed morally unjustifiable and evidentially unsustainable. The degree to which conservative voters are invested in these policies is a pretty reliable indicator of the animosity directed at those believed responsible for delaying – or even halting – their implementation.

Such political frustration is far from novel. What is new, however, is the general apprehension of those who identify as right-wing, that “the system” is ideologically rigged against them. Those subscribing to this notion are convinced that across-the-board resistance to conservative policies is not only prevalent in the upper echelons of New Zealand society, but that it also enjoys the unofficial blessing of an unhealthily large number of the nation’s unelected leaders.

As evidence of this phenomenon many of them would point to the Waitangi Tribunal’s apparent refusal to accept that the Coalition Government has a clear electoral mandate to implement policies which, in the Tribunal’s view, run counter to its understanding of te Tiriti and its constitutional significance. That the Tribunal’s judgements are typically met with the enthusiastic support of academia and the news media only confirms the Right’s belief that New Zealand’s state and social infrastructure has been tilted decisively to the left.

The surprising appointment of Richard Prebble to the Tribunal will serve as an important test as to whether that quasi-judicial body is open to being tilted to the right.

Prebble’s comeback notwithstanding, conservative New Zealand’s confusion is entirely understandable. The left-wing biases they detect in today’s institutions are the exact opposite of the biases evident across the same institutions in times past.

Historically, it was the Left who looked with dark suspicion on all the key institutions of capitalist society. Citing The Communist Manifesto, Marxists reminded their comrades that: “The executive of the modern state is nothing but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.” No genuine left-wing government, they averred, would ever be permitted to implement an authentic socialist programme.

“Don’t believe us? Just look at what happened to Salvador Allende, Harold Wilson, Norman Kirk, and Gough Whitlam in the 1970s.”

Deep down, one suspects, conservative New Zealanders are struggling to resist the terrifying conclusion that, somehow, Capitalists have convinced themselves that, far from sending their system broke, going woke is actually more likely to strengthen its hegemonic grip on the sensibilities of the post-modern West.

Perhaps it is this deep fear that explains Andrew Bayly’s self-destructive behaviour. There was a time when the servants of power found it advantageous to advertise the superior status of their masters by demonstrating the inferior status of their servants – commonly referred to “sucking up by kicking down”. Bayly’s background as an army officer, and as the paid protector of other people’s capital, would certainly have exposed him to this sort of behaviour. Unfortunately for him, however, the social strategies of the past are no longer the social strategies of the present. Drawing attention to the oppressor/oppressed dichotomy is no longer appreciated by today’s businesspeople – small or large.

Which is why Chris Hipkins’ decision to highlight Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s unwillingness to remove Bayly’s ministerial warrant was such a shrewd one. It provided the voters and, more importantly, the business community, with a vivid illustration of just how all-over-the-place Luxon’s understanding of twenty-first century politics truly is.

Andrew Bayly isn’t a bad man, but he shows every sign of being an outdated one. No politician wishing to succeed in 2024 would contemplate interacting with a fellow citizen so crassly, or so cruelly – not even in jest.

Were Luxon committed to reaffirming and reinstating all the old conservative values – i.e. a right-wing populist – then his handling of Bayly would make perfect sense. There is nothing, however, that suggests Luxon has any sympathy with the populist impulses of NZ First – or Act. On the contrary, he tries to present himself as the quintessential twenty-first century businessperson – an ambition radically at odds with the anti-woke expectations of a significant percentage of the Coalition Government’s electoral base.

Luxon should be grateful, then, that when it comes to not “getting” the frustration and resentment of conservative New Zealand – a designation which includes a large number of former Labour, as well as National, voters – his principal opponent, Chris Hipkins, is as out of sympathy with the temper of the times as he is.


This essay was originally posted on the Interest.co.nz website on Monday, 28 October 2024.

4 comments:

new view said...

You have highlighted an interesting situation Chris. A large chunk of the population still want many of the labour policies of the last government. They, along with the media can't believe a new government who were voted in on the policies they campaigned on are actually implementing many of them. How dare they. There are disaffected voters on both sides. Coalition voters who feel Luxon is trying to please and not offend anyone and Left voters who believe the step to the right is a step too far. Hipkins is testing the water with the idea of a CGT and at every turn trying to show the government in a bad light. That's his job but he will have to do better than that. Just talking about doing better economically won't cut it. he will have to show how he intends to do that. Those who oppose what this government are trying to accomplish are up against a hard core block of business NZ and those who work beside them. This group never want to see the economic destruction that was bestowed on this country by the last labour government happen again. The memory of that will linger. The problem for this coalition is that it needs to show that their policies are worth while and working. Meanwhile all we see from Labour ministers is shit stirring and deceit. IMO Any NZrs with a slightly unbiased brain will see that in reality there is nothing sensible or productive coming from Labour and their very quiet coalition mates yet, and until there is, National won't be seriously challenged.

The Barron said...

Lets break this up.

Andrew Bayly - " isn’t a bad man "...? His described behaviour is that of an entitled bully doing everything in his power to humiliate someone in their workplace. I know your are a little rusty on worker's rights, but such behaviour is unacceptable within the workplace. Indeed, the employer has a legal obligation to ensure anyone in that workplace is safe from belittling twittism. If a boss had behaved that way, there is a potential grievance, especially if repeated after it is clear that the victim finds it unwelcome. If a fellow employee behaved in the manner of Bayly, a complaint would be investigated. That an employer has to protect employees from visiting Crown Ministers is outrageous, and in every previous administration would come with a Minister stood down. Before the chattering classes of your readership comment, I am simply presenting the legal obligations as are legislated by the Parliament.

Verrall’s sister-in-law - There is absolutely nothing to indicate she did anything not by the book or by any expectation on a civil servant. It is clear that she followed the correct process of declaring a potential conflict of interest through family connection. The Ministry had the obligation to discuss this with the Minister if it felt the potential conflict reached a level. The idea of using Parliamentary privilege to name a state sector employee is an abuse of power. NZ First have a pattern of attacking judiciary and civil servants who are by virtue of their position unable to comment back. This is planned cowardice. Peters has indicated he has proof of 'leaks' and that this state employee is the source. This begs the question as to why he did not lead with the evidence, and to date has shown none. Once again, contempt for the worker.

Richard Prebble - 'an important test as to whether that quasi-judicial body is open to being tilted to the right'...? A Judicial body (quasi of otherwise) should not have left or right political leanings. The Tribunal is a standing court of enquiry. That you think there is bias does not mean there is bias. I have challenged for you to identify any decision that does not stand up to legal, historical and cultural scrutiny. The idea that Prebble will bring a bias is the best argument against his appointment. I quickly add, that is not to say the Prebble is not qualified to be on the Tribunal. He is a lawyer that has advised Iwi. However, the number of people more qualified and less controversial is immense. The idea of an expectation of a political partisanship shows a continuous attempt to undermine our institutions.

David George said...

Luxon, despite apparently trying (and failing) to be all things to everyone, is holding support, even Hipkins is not doing too bad considering his decidedly lackluster performance. Starmer in the UK, however, has crashed - now on negative 38% net approval.

greywarbler said...

Looking at the images it occurs to me that Chris Hipkins seems the smaller of the two and also David Seymour if compared to Chris Luxon. So is it the small man syndrome at work here pushing these two twerps forward? Yet looking at vehicle traffic made up of wide high vehicles, people conveyors, big is in, fat is in, showy is in, and pushing into other's territory is in. Chris is out of tune with the present refrain, and Luxon's at the end of this frenetic wave one hopes. But what's next? We wait with pregnant anticipation; pregnancy may be at the end of its long history also. AI comes, people management overcomes, all bow down to tech,
comes - oh is here. Anyone not on board is a ragged rascal.