No Enemies To The Left – Or The Right.

Wrong Turn: Labour and National can only reduce the toxic influence of their electoral competitors by rejecting their extremism.

“NO ENEMIES TO THE LEFT” has always been Labour’s rule-of-thumb. What, after all, does a moderate, left-of-centre party gain by allowing its electoral rivals to become repositories for every radical (i.e. congenitally dissatisfied) left-winger’s protest vote? To deliver effective government, a major party needs coalition partners that are weak and electorally vulnerable. Strong and electorally-secure coalition partners, as Christopher Luxon is discovering, tend to make effective government … problematic.

The classical solution to this problem requires the major parties of the Left and the Right to construct their policy platforms in such a way that only the most unrelenting ideologues would feel impelled to vote for their electoral confreres. By offering enough of what are generally perceived to be “sensible” right-wing/left-wing policies, they make it unnecessary for all but a handful of voters to venture any further along the political spectrum.

When the major parties adopt policies which a large number of their traditional supporters regard as uncharacteristic or extreme, an opportunity is created – especially under proportional representation – for those who feel deserted and/or betrayed by such behaviour to be offered a new electoral home. Labour’s embrace of “Rogernomics” forced it to entertain the Alliance and the Greens; National’s surrender to Ruth Richardson and Jenny Shipley created the opening for Winston Peters and NZ First.

The great risk for the major parties, should these “off-shoots” acquire a solid electoral foothold, is that major party strategists come to regard them as more-or-less reliable allies, rather than what they truly are – dangerous competitors. This could not be said of either Labour’s Helen Clark, or National’s John Key. When Clark was presented with the opportunity to kill the Alliance, she did not hesitate. When Peters and NZ First made themselves equally vulnerable to electoral destruction, Key dispatched them to the outer electoral darkness.

Labour either would not, or could not, replicate Key’s ruthlessness with the Greens. To date, the Green “brand” has proved sufficiently robust to withstand Labour’s “friendly fire”. Indeed, there seems to be a general reluctance on Labour’s part to treat the Greens as a serious rival. At the electorate level one occasionally hears angry accusations that the Greens are “stealing Labour’s vote” (which in Auckland Central, Wellington Central and Rongotai turned out to be no more than the truth!) but the idea of an all-out assault on the Greens has so far been dismissed by Labour’s leadership as electorally counter-productive.

From a more distant perspective, however, Labour’s tolerance of the Greens appears particularly foolish. The cultural radicalism that has largely superimposed itself over the Greens’ hitherto electorally unassailable “environmental-saviour” profile has been bleeding into Labour’s ranks for several years.

Nowhere was this more dramatically on display than in Nanaia Mahuta’s behind-the-scenes collaboration with the Greens during the “Three Waters” parliamentary debate. With Labour’s Māori Caucus acting as the surgeon, the Greens and Labour have been joined at the hip on virtually all matters relating to te Tiriti.

A similar convergence long ago became evident on transgender issues. For the best part of a week in March 2023, Labour and the Greens outbid each other in their condemnation of gender-critical provocateur, Posie Parker. As a consequence, both parties were strongly criticised for jointly contributing to the violence that accompanied Parker’s visit.

That Chris Hipkins’, upon becoming prime-minister in January 2023, either would not, or could not, add his party’s “woke” positions to Labour’s “policy bonfire” did not go unnoticed by the electorate.

Similarly, National’s low-key response to the Free Speech issue, coupled with its refusal to speak out more forcefully against “decolonisation” and “indigenisation” – policies being pursued, with Green support, by what struck many as an unheeding and ideologically-driven Labour Government – both rebounded strongly to the advantage of Act and NZ First. For a party seeking to make itself, once again, the big tent under which the overwhelming majority of right-of-centre voters could congregate, National’s weak responses were politically perplexing and electorally damaging.

Certainly, had Luxon’s 2023 share of the Party Vote (38 percent) equalled Bill English’s in 2017(44 percent) then his Coalition Agreement with Act and NZ First would have been a very different document.

It is the Labour Party, however, that has most need of an unwavering “no enemies to the left” strategy going into the 2026 general election. To understand the dangers it will face if it does not do everything it can to drive down the Greens’ support, Hipkins, or whoever replaces him, has only to consider the left-wing political debacle that is Wellington.

By 2023, Labour’s relationship with the Greens in Wellington had reached the point where voters no longer considered which of the two “left-wing” parties they supported to be all that important. As natural coalition partners, with broadly similar policies, a vote for Labour or the Greens could be presented, simply, as a vote “for the Left”. Coke, or Pepsi? It was purely a matter of taste.

Some indication of just how seriously this approach can go astray has been on more-or-less constant display since Tory Whanau was elected Mayor of Wellington, alongside a council dominated by “the Left”. The result has been a hot mess, as unedifying as it has been ineffectually extravagant.

If left-wing politicians believe that on the big issues they are as one, then they will start sweating the small issues. Inevitably, these small issues reveal themselves to be the big issues, helpfully reduced by unelected bureaucrats to bite-sized chunks. The resulting division, bitterness, and recrimination benefits nobody but the Right.

In what may yet turn out to be the decisive battle, Labour finally did the right thing. It stood by its policy of opposing asset sales. In doing so, however, its representatives incurred the wrath of their ultra-left “comrades”. These latter construed the vote to retain the Council’s airport shares as a repudiation of the Treaty rights of Wellington’s mana whenua, or, at least, of their unelected representatives.

The American political philosopher, Susan Neiman, wrote a book called “Left Is Not Woke”. The recent behaviour of Wellington City Council offers a vivid illustration of her thesis.

If Labour refuses to re-make itself as a moderate left-leaning party, with policies corresponding to the wishes of the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders keen to see the back of the National-Act-NZ First Coalition Government, then it will remain in Opposition. While the voters are encouraged to see the Greens – and Te Pāti Māori – as Labour’s “natural” partners, espousing policies largely indistinguishable from its own, they will continue to hold their noses and vote for whichever right-wing party they consider the least objectionable.

Labour needs to reduce the toxic influence of the parties to its left by making it clear that it has put its own woke inclinations behind it. This will be a twofer for whoever has the guts to make it happen. Not only will it reduce (or even eliminate) the electoral irritants to the party’s left, but it will also, as an added bonus, neutralise the equally irritating woke faction cluttering-up its own ranks. Indeed, achieving the first objective is absolutely contingent upon achieving the second. 

This essay was originally posted on the Interest.co.nz website on Monday, 14 October 2024.

The Radical Consequences Of Doing As Little As Possible.

The Man With His Hand On The Handbrake: NZ First’s participation in government is defined not so much by what it does, but by what it prevents its coalition partners from doing. Photo by Richard Harman.

IN THE NORMAL COURSE OF EVENTS New Zealand general elections are won and lost in the centre-ground. Even under MMP, the multiplicity of parties is more apparent than real. For the most part, the minor parties are ideological outriders, positioned to the left or right of the more moderate political sentiment pursued by the majors. When National showed signs of losing its taste for economic reform, Act stepped forward to keep it honest. When Labour embraced neoliberalism in the 1980s, it spawned a succession of protest parties: NewLabour, the Alliance, the Greens; to keep the progressive flag flying. It is, therefore, a pretty straightforward exercise to work out who will go with whom after the votes have been counted. Everyone knows that the outriders have only one credible choice of coalition partner.

What makes the NZ First Party such a difficult political proposition is that it is the only party which claims the centre – not the centre-right or the centre-left – as its natural home. Since its foundation in July 1993, NZ First’s consistent pitch to voters has been that National and Labour are fraudulent centrists: pretending to moderation while secretly embracing extremism. Coming from the National Party, the founder and leader of NZ First, Winston Peters, has witnessed at close hand the enormous political effort required to prevent New Zealand’s business and farming interests from bending successive governments’ economic and social policies to their will. Peters knows what a radical undertaking the defence of moderation has always been.

Radicalism of any sort is disruptive, and the sort of radical populist interventions required to thwart the predatory intentions of the Australian banks, big business, the agricultural sector, large public sector unions and iwi-based corporates must entail major disruptions. This explains the unabashed hostility towards NZ First which has become the default position of virtually all the other political parties. They know that any coalition relationship with Peters and NZ First is bound to involve the frequent use of the party’s infamous “handbrake”. NZ First’s participation in government is defined not so much by what it does, but by what it prevents its coalition partners from doing.

The first coalition government of which NZ First was a part illustrates the political dilemma created by the mere presence of a genuinely centrist party. The changes demanded by NZ First were small-scale, but very popular: free doctor’s visits for children under six years old; generous concessions for superannuitants. They were bearable. But, NZ First’s refusal to support any further privatisations of municipally- and/or state-owned enterprises most certainly was not. National’s “dries” could not countenance such a direct challenge to the core tenets of neoliberalism. The successful plot, first to oust Jim Bolger (the coalition’s enabler) and then to dismiss Peters and his party, gave the lie to National’s pretentions to moderation. It also illustrated in the most vivid terms the radically disruptive effect of, in effect, doing nothing.

NZ First’s coalition with Jacinda Ardern’s Labour Party also illustrates the disruptive effect of centrist aspirations, this time from the point of view of a populist party which had quickly become profoundly alarmed at both the inexperience of its senior coalition partner’s ministers, and what its leader and his colleagues were persuaded was the extremism of some of those ministers’ ambitions. It was not long before NZ First was reaching for the handbrake – most notably in relation to Labour’s preference for a Capital Gains Tax. Here, again, we see NZ First’s strong reluctance to disturb the status quo. Tax-free capital gain constitutes a vital part of New Zealand’s small enterprises’ business model. Peters was unconvinced that his Labour colleagues fully grasped the likely consequences – economic and cultural – of introducing a CGT.

Peters’ apprehension concerning the extremism permeating Labour’s parliamentary ranks was subsequently borne out by the eventual release of the He Puapua Report. The fact that the far-reaching recommendations of this guide to New Zealand becoming fully compliant, by 2040, with the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples had been kept from them was bitterly resented by NZ First and its leader.

Had it known about He Puapua, it is likely that NZ First, by campaigning strongly against it, would have remained above the 5 percent MMP threshold. While it is probable that the 2020 general election would have freed Labour from the need for NZ First’s support, Peters’ mere presence in the House would have strengthened the opposition to Labour’s decolonisation and indigenisation efforts significantly. In these circumstances, Act’s opinion poll support may not have surged so dramatically, and the 2023 electoral battlefield would look quite different.

Certainly, Act’s implacable opposition to serving alongside Peters and his colleagues in a National-Act-NZ First coalition government lends strength to the argument that political parties determined to keep the actions of a multi-party government within the parameters of public tolerance cannot avoid having a decisive impact on its conduct.

A National-led government committed to a purely ameliorative programme vis-à-vis infrastructure, housing, health and education would, surely, welcome the support of a similarly inclined NZ First? That the National leader, Christopher Luxon, has, to date, had so little to say on whether he would, or would not, welcome Peters’ participation in a coalition government, suggests strongly that his party’s ambitions fall well short of the grandiose. Unfortunately for Luxon, the same cannot be said for the ambitions of David Seymour and Act.

Act’s radicalism may yet prove its undoing. Were Peters and NZ First to retire to the cross-benches, promising their support for any confidence motion in a National-Act minority government (in much the same way as the Greens promised their support for a Labour-Alliance minority government back in 1999) Luxon would become New Zealand’s next prime minister. The downside of this arrangement would be that he and his party would be governing as hostages to Act’s extreme policy agenda.

While NZ First could vote for those items on National-Act’s agenda enjoying majority support, and for which it had also campaigned, this would not be the case when it came to Act’s hardline economic and social policies. As the time for National-Act to present their first Budget drew near, the question of whether Peters’ promise of confidence also included “supply” would become increasingly acute.

Were NZ First to say “This far – but no further!” and join with Labour, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori in voting down a cruel austerity Budget, a new election would have to be called. With Act having demonstrated what it is made of, Peters and NZ First might humbly invite the electorate to provide National with a less extreme coalition partner. One not so determined to force unkind and unwanted policies down the electorate’s throat.

Of course, all the pundits will opine that any party forcing a snap election so soon after a general election will be punished mercilessly by the voters. It is possible, too, that if given the option of a second crack at getting the country back on the right track, the electors might opt for Labour-Green-Te Pāti Māori. Then again, a great many of those same electors, marvelling at the political magic of the Great Centrist Showman, might give him exactly what he asks for – thereby confirming the radical consequences of doing as little as possible and as much as necessary.

This essay was originally posted on the Interest.co.nz website of Monday, 14 August 2023.

Sweet Moderation.

Balancing Act: Looming behind the comparatively modest voting tallies of the minor parties, is the clear preponderance of the votes cast in favour of the major parties. Should push come to shove, with the minor parties refusing to play ball unless their key policies are accepted, the prospect of a Grand Coalition of National and Labour will swiftly emerge as the crucial disciplinary threat.

THE PROBLEM FACING EVERY LEFTIST on 14 October is whether any vote they cast will bring anything resembling progressive change. Gaming it out, the radical voter always loses. There is no combination, short of an absolute majority for either the Greens or Te Pāti Māori (TPM) that holds out the slightest hope of delivering genuine transformational change. And, let’s be honest, the chances of either the Greens or TPM claiming an absolute majority of the Party Vote are as close to zero as makes no difference.

But, for the sake of argument, let’s embrace the most wildly optimistic scenario. Labour, after a surprisingly effective campaign, takes 35 percent of the Party Vote. Somehow, the Greens do enough to hold on to their 2020 Party Vote of around 8 percent. TPM, to the shock and surprise of the pundits, proves the Roy Morgan pollsters right by winning 7 percent of the Party Vote.

On paper, that’s a pretty creditable victory for the Left. Labour with 45 seats, the Greens with 10 seats, TPM with 9 seats: together they command 64 seats – more than enough for an effective coalition to govern. But, honestly, what are the chances of cobbling together a radical programme out of the policies of these three very different political parties? The truthful answer is: Not Good.

With more than twice the number of seats than the Greens and TPM combined, Labour will see no reason why it should not call the shots on all serious policy issues. Having ruled out a whole swag of radical Green and TPM policies in the run-up to the election, Labour’s negotiators would present their plurality of the Party Vote as a clear endorsement of the Government’s moderation. Wealth and windfall taxes would be off the table. GST would remain on food. There would be no state-owned supermarket chain supplied by iwi growers.

In staking out this ground, Labour would receive the near unanimous backing of the business community, the mainstream news media, and (from behind the scenes) the public service. After all, the defenders of the status quo would argue, the combined Party Votes for Labour and National account for more than two-thirds of the electorate. Moderation, they would say, won the election – not radicalism. The radical parties of the Left must, therefore, accept that on all important matters the will of the Labour Party must prevail. Had National and Act secured the majority, Act’s radicalism would have had to be similarly curtailed.

Okay, okay, we know: there is no way the Greens and TPM are about to let themselves be thrust back in their boxes – not this time. This time they’re going to play hard ball: no substantive concessions – no votes. This time, from the cross-benches, the Greens and TPM fully intend to control the flow of events. After all, Labour cannot govern without them. So, this time, it’s Labour that will have to bend.

But taihoa, comrades, you’re not thinking this through! There are no cross-benches for you to sit on – not yet. The summoning of Parliament is one of the very few powers reserved to King Charles III, or his representative (in this case the Governor-General Dame Cindy Kiro) and constitutional convention requires that the Crown be satisfied that one or more of the parties elected is in a position to govern the Realm. And, when the Crown says “govern” it means run the country effectively, efficiently, and reliably for three years. Not precariously, from vote to vote, at the whim of one or more of the minor parties.

And, don’t forget, the person advising the Governor-General through this fraught process will be Chris Hipkins. Sure, he will only be a “caretaker” prime minister, but constitutionally he remains the politician Dame Cindy must turn to first. It will be Chippy who keeps her up-to-speed, vis-à-vis the Greens and TPM, right up to the moment he and his colleagues decide it is time to inform the Governor-General that Labour’s negotiations with the Greens and TPM have reached an impasse.

At that point, Dame Cindy will pick up the phone and direct a few well-chosen questions to James Shaw and Marama Davidson. Will their party allow Chris Hipkins to form a strong and stable administration? Will he be able to rely upon the Greens to refrain from turning every important policy decision into a battle of political wills?

What are the chances, really, of James and Marama saying anything other than “Yes”? And then, what are the chances of the designated representatives of the Green membership tipping New Zealand into a constitutional crisis by refusing to back their leaders?

Not that such a refusal would stop the step-by-step Vice-Regal advance towards a resolution of the developing crisis. Dame Cindy’s next move would be to pick up the phone and direct the same questions to Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa Packer. And their response, almost certainly, would be to put off answering Dame Cindy until the TPM President, John Tamihere, had had a brass-knuckle discussion with Chris Hipkins and Willie Jackson about what Labour needed to do to secure TPM’s unswerving backing.

Were Chippy and Willie to promise moving the constitutional/Te Tiriti debate to the next level, while pouring a truly outrageous amount of money into Whanau Ora, would John, Rawiri and Debbie say “Yes”? Almost certainly, they would. The TPM call to Government House would be made.

All eyes would now be on the Greens – assuming they hadn’t already caved. Once again the phone would ring. This time Dame Cindy would let them know that if they continued to withhold the votes Mr Hipkins needs, then her next call will be to Mr Luxon.

And if that call was made, to whom would Christopher Luxon speak next? Chris Hipkins? Definitely. John Tamihere? Possibly. David Seymour? Not if he’s got any sense. You see where this is going, don’t you?

Certainly, both James Shaw and Marama Davidson are quite intelligent enough to know who will end up getting blamed if New Zealand, driven by their intransigence, moves inexorably towards a Grand Coalition. That’s why, after securing Chippy’s promise of four Green seats at the Cabinet Table, the reply to the Governor-General will be “Yes.”

Because, it is utterly unrealistic to believe that the National Party will keep baling a left-wing government out of its multiplying parliamentary difficulties by ponying-up with the needed votes whenever the PM calls. If that’s the way of things, then why not demand the Deputy-Prime Ministership for Luxon? Why not secure multiple National Party seats at the Cabinet Table? In other words: why not go all-in for a Grand Coalition? Either that, or force a new election.

It just isn’t that easy to hold a whole country to ransom – especially when your party, or parties, emerged from the election with 15 percent of the Party Vote. In the end, a democratically-governed state simply will not attempt to rule in defiance of public opinion. If a clear majority of the electorate declines to vote for the revolutionary option, then – one way or the other – the policies of sweet moderation will prevail.

This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Friday, 21 July 2023.

An Authoritarian Tumour In New Zealand's Democratic Brain.

Marching In Step: What so many of our politicians and pundits appear to expect from government, even when it is composed of two or more political parties, is strict military discipline at every level. The orders of the Prime Minister, like the orders of a generalissimo, must not be countermanded. Cabinet ministers assume the role of said generalissimo’s staff officers and the remaining backbench MPs become her troops.

SOMETHING IS GROWING in the New Zealand brain. An authoritarian tumour whose rapid expansion is triggering increasingly morbid symptoms in the body politic. Institutions and professions upon which New Zealanders traditionally relied for wisdom and good judgement have taken to displaying neither. Our national discourse has taken on a brutish quality: a coarseness and violence which discourages the participation of all but the most resilient of citizens.

Nowhere is the evidence of this authoritarian tumour more clearly on display than in the relentless disparagement of the coalition government led by Jacinda Ardern and Winston Peters. The lively reality of its tripartite character strikes an alarming number of pundits and politicians as evidence of a profound malfunctioning in the country’s political system. That the malfunction identified by these “experts” turns out to be democracy itself is even more alarming.

That there should be sharp disagreements between three quite different political parties and their respective leaders should surprise no one – especially when those parties have collectively assumed responsibility for governing the nation. As citizens, we are protected by the constitutional requirement that our governments must, at all times, command a majority in the House of Representatives. If, therefore, it is to go on governing, all disagreements within and between the component parts of that majority, no matter how sharp, must be resolved. If a resolution of differences cannot be achieved, then the responsibility must be returned to us – the voters.

How, then, to explain the near panic displayed by a phalanx of right-wing politicians and pundits whenever these entirely predictable disagreements between the coalition government’s members are aired in public? What is it that they expect from government, when evidence of debate – even open dissent – can throw them into such an agitated state?

There is only one credible answer to this question – and it is deeply troubling. What so many of our politicians and pundits expect from government, even when it is composed of two or more political parties, is strict military discipline at every level. The orders of the Prime Minister, like the orders of a generalissimo, must not be countermanded. Cabinet ministers assume the role of said generalissimo’s staff officers and the remaining backbench MPs become her troops.

But a political party is not an army. Whoever, outside of a revolution, heard of soldiers electing their generals! Why then do so many professional politics-watchers consider disagreement within a government’s ranks to be evidence of, at best, insubordination, or, at worst, mutiny? Why is the inevitable churn of political “Ins” and “Outs” invariably described as “a leadership coup” – as if changing leaders is an inherently bad thing to do?

Could it be that the reason the Right becomes so agitated at the sight of discussion and debate within the ranks of government is that it comports so uncomfortably with the way the people who elect governments are expected to live their daily lives? The complex hierarchies of the workplace, no less than those of the armed forces, owe nothing to democracy. Whoever, outside of a revolution, heard of workers electing their boss!

Could it be that the politicians and pundits of the Right are more likely than not to consider an undisciplined government to be guilty of letting the side down? After all, if ordinary citizens see their prime minister shrug-off the occasional disagreement between her and her deputy as simply democracy in action, then why can’t their bosses? If debate, even dissent, is treated by coalition party leaders as a healthy sign of political life – rather than a sacking offence – then why shouldn’t they have a say in how their workplace is run?

As corporate-style “governance” has acquired an ever-greater purchase over our lives; as all the countervailing powers within the workplace – viz: trade unions – have shrunk in influence; the huge discrepancy between the democratic freedom and equality that is supposed to characterise our political selves, and the exploitation and servitude which increasingly characterises our economic selves, acquires an decidedly subversive aspect.

The morbid authoritarian tumour which is taking over more and more of the New Zealand brain is in danger of extinguishing completely our national disinclination toward bending the knee to bullies, along with our much admired habit of thinking for ourselves. A government that’s willing to model both of these quintessentially Kiwi characteristics is to be commended – not condemned.

This essay was originally published in The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 21 September 2018.

NZ First’s Radical Conservatism Must Triumph Before Labour-Greens’ Radical Progressivism Can Succeed.

Putting NZ First's Things First: The crucial political failure of Labour and the Greens is that they have yet to appreciate that without the realisation of the radical conservatives’ programme, the chances of a radically progressive programme succeeding are nil. Until the slums of neoliberalism have been cleared, a New Zealand fit to live in cannot be built.

LET’S GET ONE thing straight: this government is not a “pure MMP coalition”. On the contrary, it is a most impure political arrangement. A “pure” MMP coalition is one in which all of the component parties share, to a greater or lesser extent, a set of common philosophical convictions. The National-NZ First coalition government of 1996-97 was one such; likewise the Labour-Alliance minority coalition government of 1999-2002; which was, it is often forgotten, kept in office by a confidence-and-supply agreement with the Greens.

Jim Bolger and Winston Peters – the two principal players in the National-NZ First coalition government – had for many years sat in the same caucus. Both of them grew up in large, and far from affluent, rural families. Neither politician had much in the way of sympathy for trade unions. It was Jim Bolger who commissioned his long-time friend and ally, Bill Birch, to shepherd the Employment Contracts Bill through Parliament. And, it was Winston Peters who voted for that extraordinary piece of union-busting legislation without demur. Both men were staunch supporters of private enterprise.

Significantly, the Labour-Alliance coalition government was also led by two politicians who had sat together in the same party caucus. Helen Clark and Jim Anderton had been friends and comrades for many years until, as happened to so many friends and comrades in the Labour Party, they fell out over what came to be known as “Rogernomics”. By 1998, however, the civil war on the left of New Zealand electoral politics had been brought to a close. Labour and the Alliance were pledged to form a “loose” progressive coalition if the votes went their way in the 1999 election – which they did.

This current government, however, is a very different proposition from nearly all of the coalitions which preceded it. The votes of all three of its component parties: Labour, NZ First and the Greens; must be combined before any piece of government legislation can pass through the House of Representatives. Accordingly, the withdrawal of support by any one of this governing troika of parties can kill any bill.

To make the politics of this coalition government even more intractable, the NZ First Party is philosophically out-of-step with its allies. It has thrown in its lot with the parties of the left for one reason, and one reason only: because it allowed itself to be convinced that Labour’s and the Greens’ hostility to the neoliberal order was as unflinching as its own. In the nearly 12 months that have elapsed since the 2017 general election, however, NZ First and its leader have been given more and more cause to believe that Labour’s and the Greens’ opposition to neoliberalism is more rhetorical than real.

In the absence of genuine and decisive moves against the core elements of the economic and social order erected by Roger Douglas and Ruth Richardson, Winston Peters and his party have felt obliged to protect their electoral flanks by either vetoing or delaying the “progressive” legislation promoted by Labour and the Greens.

Peters’ “partners” have been aggrieved by these interventions. But, if Labour and the Greens really believed that NZ First: the law-and-order party; the anti-immigration party; was going to vote for the repeal of the “three-strikes” legislation, or a doubling of the refugee quota, absent the political cover provided by an uncompromising roll-back of neoliberalism; then they were dreaming. Likewise, with the key amendments to the Employment Relations Act. Without the covering fire of “Big Change”, the instinctively anti-union Peters has opted to keep his right-wing powder dry.

The leader of NZ First has no intention of emulating the behaviour of the Alliance leader, Jim Anderton. Once seated at the cabinet table, Anderton, felt obliged to follow Labour’s lead in all things: a strategy that saw the Alliance’s electoral support evaporate at an alarming rate. Peters has done his best to avoid being precipitately or unreasonably obstructive. He did, after all, swallow the dead rats of the resurrection of the TPP and the Labour-Green decision to call a halt to offshore oil and gas exploration. The problem, from NZ First’s perspective, is that the more compromises the party makes to its left-wing partners, the more it is expected to make. Peters is simply making it clear that there are limits to his co-operation. A warrior he may be – but he’s not a Social Justice Warrior!

Which brings us to the truly original aspect of the current coalition: the potential for at least one of its partners to go over to the Opposition, break up the coalition, and bring down the government – without the need for a new election. It would be a dangerous move, but what other option would NZ First – an essentially conservative political party – have if it found itself expected to vote for one piece of radical legislation after another? Coalitions are not suicide pacts.

What Labour and the Greens have apparently failed to grasp is that Peters is committed to facilitating not a radically progressive, but a radically conservative revolution. NZ First’s political programme is dedicated not to carrying our nation forward but to taking their country back. The New Zealand which Peters and his colleagues is seeking to restore is the New Zealand whose provinces thrived; whose families felt secure; whose culture was proudly British (with just a smidgen of Maoritanga thrown in for good measure) and whose future was something to be shaped by the hands of its own people – not the talons of a rapacious and globalised capitalism.

The crucial political failure of Labour and the Greens is that they have yet to appreciate that without the realisation of the radical conservatives’ programme, the chances of a radically progressive programme succeeding are nil. Until the slums of neoliberalism have been cleared, a New Zealand fit to live in cannot be built.

This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Friday, 14 September 2018.

Asking The Right Questions.

Mouth Wide Shut: James Shaw is hoping that if he and his caucus colleagues are seen as good team-players, then by 2020 the Greens will have earned the voters’ respect and, more importantly, their votes.

THE BEST WAY to characterise the Greens curious policy on parliamentary questions is as a gesture of good will. Not, as some might be thinking, towards the National Party, but to their partners in government – Labour and NZ First.

So long as those one or two questions per sitting day remained, the temptation would always be there for the more radical members of the Green Party caucus to use them. Indeed, Marama Davidson has made it clear to Green Party members that she regards it as her duty to ask the questions they need answers to – no matter how embarrassing.

If elected as their new female co-leader, she sees herself as ideally placed to keep the Greens’ brand sharply and safely differentiated from every other party in Parliament. Unlike her opponent, Julie Anne Genter, she is without ministerial responsibilities. That leaves her free to speak truth to power.

Being “spoken to” by a Green Party co-leader determined to raise aloft Metiria Turei’s tattered banner is not, however, anywhere near the top of either Jacinda Ardern’s or Winston Peters’ to-do lists.

Like all political leaders, they fear even the perception of disunity. As far as they’re concerned, most voters do not draw a distinction between the well-intentioned and principled criticism of a government’s friends and the uncompromising and ill-intentioned opposition of its foes. To raise doubts about the Government’s overall policy direction will only weaken it. In the context of electoral politics, dissent is almost always interpreted as treason.

The Greens’ decision to give up their questions to the National Party (and just how that decision was made, and by whom, remains unclear) suggests that at least some of the party’s MPs also fear the prospect of disunity and are keen to keep dissent on the down-low.

Clearly, they are of the view that only by presenting the voters with an image of industrious and effective teamwork can the Greens hope to elude the historical hoodoo of small parties being destroyed on account of their association with large ones.

Whether it be the fate of NZ First’s, Act’s and the Maori Party’s doomed associations with National, or the Alliance’s messy divorce from Labour (the only known case of the kids deciding who should have custody of the parents!) the precedents are far from encouraging!

Paradoxically, Marama Davidson’s and her fellow fundis’ (fundamentalists) view of this problem is very much the same as James Shaw’s realos (realists). Both factions are convinced that the best way to escape the small party curse is by drawing the voters’ attention to the nature of their party’s relationship with its larger partners.

Shaw hopes that by being good team-players the Greens will earn the voters’ respect and, more importantly, their votes. Davidson believes that it is only by differentiating the Greens from Labour and NZ First, and by reassuring the voters that their MPs have not “sold out” their principles, that they will be returned to Parliament.

Neither of these strategies are likely to prove effective. The first reduces the Greens to docile little lambs; the second makes them look like irritating little bastards. That the voters will, almost certainly, reject both of their survival “solutions” is clear to everyone except the Greens themselves.

What both factions need to grasp is that the Green Party has always been about ideas. Forthrightly addressing the big questions confronting people and planet and offering uncompromising answers. That’s the “special sauce” in the Greens’ recipe for electoral success.

The more clearly Greens describe the challenges confronting humanity, the easier it is made for the voters to accept the radicalism required for their remedy.

Getting back into Parliament is not about keeping your head down and working hard; nor is it about shouting slogans and throwing stones.

The unchanging objective of all Green parties is to make it known to the voters that while they are willing to achieve as much as they can in co-operation with other parties; their focus will remain forever fixed upon the measures required to address the injustices identified by the human conscience and to resolve the problems identified by human science.

The Greens’ message from now until 2020 must be: The steps we are currently taking are in the right direction – but they’re too small. If we’re to travel further, our vote must be bigger.

This essay was originally published in The Waikato Times, The Taranaki Daily News, The Timaru Herald, The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 23 March 2018.

What Are The Greens Playing At?

"WTF, James!" The Greens do not appear to understand that the key to improving their party’s position electorally, as well as strengthening its hand politically, lies in conceiving of the Labour-NZ First-Green government as a single entity: one which must either hang together or, most assuredly, it will hang separately! Stealing their comrades’ electoral lunch, in these circumstances, can only damage the Greens every bit as much as it damages (and enrages!) Labour and NZ First.

WHAT DO THE GREENS think they’re playing at? Their response to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) has done themselves, and the government they’re ostensibly part of, a huge disservice. Honestly, it’s the sort of reaction one might expect from a clutch of radical student politicians: long on “principle”, short on common-sense. If this is how the Greens plan to conduct themselves over the next three years, then they had better find themselves an electorate they can win (without Labour’s support!) and fast. Because keeping their party above the 5 percent MMP threshold is likely to prove a constant struggle.

Perhaps they’ve convinced themselves that by waving their anti-TPP banners across Twitter and Facebook they will pick up all those “woke” voters who’ve accused Jacinda Ardern and David Parker of “selling out” to global capitalism at Danang. How many might that be? Almost certainly a lot fewer than the very substantial number of generous Labour supporters who gave the Greens their Party Vote on 23 September to make sure they didn’t disappear from Parliament altogether. If the Greens aren’t willing to reciprocate that sort of solidarity, then there’s bugger-all chance of it being repeated!

The Greens do not appear to understand that the key to improving their party’s position electorally, as well as strengthening its hand politically, lies in conceiving of the Labour-NZ First-Green government as a single entity: one which must either hang together or, most assuredly, it will hang separately! Stealing their comrades’ electoral lunch, in these circumstances, can only damage the Greens every bit as much as it damages (and enrages!) Labour and NZ First.

But, then, strategic (or even tactical!) thinking would not appear to be the Greens’ strong suit. Was there no one in their caucus capable of imagining the grim spectre that was bound to be raised by their very public repudiation of the CPTPP? Not one person in their ranks with the wit to realise that by withdrawing their 8 votes from the Government, the Greens would be driving Jacinda straight into the arms of Bill English and the National Party? Did no Green MP pause to consider the “optics” of that? Of how much damage it would inflict on all three of the governing parties?

Even if Labour capitulated at the last moment, and agreed to pull New Zealand out of the CPTPP – would the Greens count that as a “victory”? If so, they’d be wrong. Such a public demonstration of the tail wagging the dog would be catastrophic for Labour and the Greens alike. And if Labour refused to be blackmailed and allowed the National Party to ride to its rescue? What would that say about the viability of the Labour-NZ First-Green government? What would it mean for the relationship between Jacinda and James Shaw? Labour’s wrath would be terrible to behold – but not as terrible as their revenge!

It all could have been handled so differently. All that was required of the Greens’ caucus was some evidence they understood that contributing usefully to the work of a progressive government requires just a little more in the way of political finesse than denying the right of free speech to a handful of National Front tragics in Parliament grounds.

On the CPTPP issue, for example, the Greens could have reached out to their Canadian counterparts for advice on how to build the largest possible political consensus around what should – and should not – be included in a multilateral trade agreement. In this, they would have been doing Labour a huge favour: making the arguments that the Prime Minister and her Trade Minister could not be seen to make, but which would, nevertheless, strengthen their hand in future negotiations.

As it is, by firing off all their “principled” bullets at once (and before their target was even within range!) they have taken themselves out of the game. Even worse, they have demonstrated, beyond reasonable doubt, that they don’t even know what the game is – or how to play it!

That is not something which can be said of NZ First. Winston Peters has maintained a judicious silence concerning the desirability – or otherwise – of the CPTPP. He will study the problem professionally, from all angles, until he locates exactly the right point to exercise his leverage.

My advice to the Greens? Watch and learn.

This essay was originally published in The Waikato Times, The Taranaki Daily News, The Timaru Herald, The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 17 November 2017.