Governments have to run on their record. Last term, Labour successfully locked down the country. Then they overdid the lockdowns. This term what has Labour achieved?
Labour inherited a strong economy and an excellent set of books. Labour promised to be fiscally prudent. Covid was used as an excuse to wriggle out of that pledge.
Labour did inherit issues in housing, health and education. After five years the issues are worse. Tens of thousands of households are going to struggle to service 8 per cent mortgages. Health services are failing. The Government’s priority is a Maori Health Authority. Meanwhile, 98 per cent of pupils graduating from decile 10 schools would fail NCEA literacy.
In every election, it’s the economy that takes centre stage. Inflation is at a 30-year high. The Reserve Bank says government spending is contributing to inflation; it has hiked interest rates and is forecasting an election-year recession. Now that the Governor has been re-appointed he has become bold.
It feels like karma. Labour’s re-election was helped by the Reserve Bank at one stage printing a billion dollars a week to pump up the economy. To correct the inflation caused by that money printing the Reserve Bank is helping defeat Labour.
No one would want to campaign on Labour’s record. All Labour can do is try to convince us that National and Christopher Luxon would be worse. It is possible but hard to imagine.
NZ Herald
Yes, Labour literally has no achievements and plenty of failures. Kiwibuild, light rail, Auckland Harbour crossing, affordable housing, child poverty, emergency housing waiting lists, state housing waiting lists, hospital wait times, surgery waiting lists…the list of zero delivery, underperformance, wasteful spending is endless. Even Jacinda Ardern’s “year of delivery” was nothing more than a slogan. Nothing was delivered; the year of delivery turned out to be either a stillbirth or an abortion. I’m thinking it was more of an abortion than anything else.
What is the Labour Party to do? Well, attack Christopher Luxon, naturally.
Who cares whether Luxon understands the finer points of Labour’s electric car subsidies? The policy is nonsense. Labour and the Greens’ record on climate change is abysmal. New Zealand’s climate response was criticised at the recent COP27.
Luxon wants to run on as little policy as he can. He has used the Reserve Bank Governor’s statement as an excuse to shelve National’s tax policy. He is going to make himself a very small target.
National will just promise to be a good manager. Luxon would rather be criticised for having no policy than be attacked for the policy that he does have.
Labour cannot run on its record but National has no policy to attack.
NZ Herald
National’s and Luxon’s election strategy can be summed up as the same as John Key’s…they are promising to be like Labour, but less shit and more efficient. It’s a strategy: make yourself a small target, don’t scare the horses, and then win. But 2023 is not at all like 2008. National followed a competent Helen Clark Government, in which Michael Cullen had done a good job on the books. Labour in 2023 has squandered billions and locked in billions of extra spending, but hasn’t provided funding for it in any future budget. They’ve poisoned the well and National sadly is going to have to drink it.
Add to that the race-based electoral poison they are dripping into legislation as they move to usurp our constitution in favour of a Maori-led apartheid system against all others.
Labour must press ahead with its unpopular Three Waters. Labour is fighting a two-front election campaign. National and Act on one front. The Maori Party on the second front. Labour cannot abandon co-government without also abandoning the Maori seats.
The next 12 months are going to be very dangerous. We have no written constitution restraining Labour. The only sanction on any government is the knowledge that they will be accountable in an election. This is why three years may be too short for a good government but too long for a bad one.
Ministers can read the polls. Labour will ignore the Reserve Bank’s advice.
Ministers will go on borrowing and spending. Labour intends to leave inflation as the next government’s problem. Paying back the borrowing is another problem for a future government. It is called laying a minefield.
NZ Herald
Mines that Luxon has shown he is very adept at standing on.
Luxon and Act’s David Seymour had better factor into their plans the likelihood of many unexploded bombs. The health system appears close to a systematic failure. The briefing for the incoming ministers in many portfolios will make a very grim reading.
There is an even greater danger. MPs who think they are dog tucker can be tempted to try to defeat the outcome of the election.
It is fundamental to democracy that one parliament cannot bind future parliaments.
NZ Herald
Except Labour are trying to do that too!
In the Three Waters bill that critics say privatises billions of dollars of ratepayers’ assets into effective ownership by tribal entities, Green MP Eugenie Sage has an amendment. The amendment requires a 60 per cent vote by future parliaments to privatise the assets. Go figure. Intellectual rigour is not prized in the Green caucus. Under urgency, Labour supported the Green Party amendment.
In 168 years of the New Zealand Parliament, no government has ever attempted to entrench its policies. The only entrenched law is a provision passed with bi-partisan support to safeguard democracy. A future parliament cannot change the electoral law without 75 per cent support.
Labour and the Greens have committed a constitutional outrage. It is an attack on democracy. Even if the reaction forces a U-turn it shows Labour and the Greens are willing to abuse their power.
Lame duck governments are dangerous.
NZ Herald
No one is prepared to say it, so it’s up to me. What we are witnessing is an incremental coup d’etat, where our existing constitutional norms and laws are being trampled on by a Government intent on locking out the centre-right and the majority of New Zealanders, in favour of an unelected Maori iwi elite, accountable to no one. It is that serious.
New Zealanders are so laid back they’ve fallen asleep as this Government destroys our society. What on earth will it take for voters to rise up and say enough?
Cam Slater is a New Zealand-based blogger, best known for his role in Dirty Politics and publishing the Whale Oil Beef Hooked blog, which operated from 2005 until it closed in 2019. This article was first published HERE
1 comment:
You are so right Cam.
I could not agree with you more. It's a pity others in the media don't have enough balls to really say what is going on.
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