There are, Brown believes, sensible, competent and moderate people in both major parties. There are also, he has observed, individuals of less outstanding calibre in the minor parties.
The self-styled Prime Minister of Auckland has been mulling this problem, and earlier this year settled on a solution. Now. I am wary of politicians and their solutions, but Brown isn’t your standard office holder.
He built a career outside of politics; demonstrating competence, an appetite for risk, and a willingness to do the mahi needed to make things work.
Brown wrote in March that MMP empowers minor radical parties. The idea, and he isn’t wrong, is that each large party becomes beholden to the fringes in order to form a government.
His diagnosis is correct. National and Labour are closer to each other than either is to their coalition parties.
If you talk to Labour MPs they would rather swim the Pacific in winter than form a coalition with either the Greens or Te Pati Maori.
He built a career outside of politics; demonstrating competence, an appetite for risk, and a willingness to do the mahi needed to make things work.
Brown wrote in March that MMP empowers minor radical parties. The idea, and he isn’t wrong, is that each large party becomes beholden to the fringes in order to form a government.
His diagnosis is correct. National and Labour are closer to each other than either is to their coalition parties.
If you talk to Labour MPs they would rather swim the Pacific in winter than form a coalition with either the Greens or Te Pati Maori.
Political leaders Chris Hipkins and Christopher Luxon
shake hands after formal apologies were made to survivors
of abuse in state and faith based care.
Photo: Robert Kitchin / THE POST
Meanwhile National ministers express frustration with NZ First’s refusal to tackle superannuation, and Act’s uncompromising desire to balance the budget.
Brown proposes a grand coalition. The largest party presumably would get the Prime Minister, the junior party Finance, and between them a Cabinet of competent rivals could tackle the hard decisions that successive governments have, since the fall of Ruth Richardson as Finance Minister in 1993, avoided.
MMP drives fiscal irresponsibility. The minor parties have authority without responsibility. NZ First can campaign on protecting pensions for millionaire retirees paid for with debt and win seats at the Cabinet table on the back of a reckless and unsustainable policy.
The Greens counter with free healthcare and dental paid for with a wealth tax they know Parliament will never pass even if Labour agrees to the free dental in order to ride in the Crown limousines one more time.
There is a quote, its origin unknown but inaccurately attributed to Scottish judge and writer, Alexander Tytler, the Lord Woodhouselee, who died in 1813.
Tytler wrote extensively on the limits of democracy and his ideas have been credited with ‘Tytler’s warning’, although there is no evidence he formulated the specific idea: A democracy will collapse once voters realise they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury.
MMP compounds this problem by allowing the segmentation of self-interested constituencies while the moderate centre becomes marginalised.
Those with the burden of balancing the competing claims find themselves in an impossible situation and we can see evidence of the current finance minister reaching across the aisle to see if there is an alternative to her coalition partners.
In the recent Mood of the Boardroom debate, Nicola Willis, clearly frustrated at Winston Peters’ reluctance to consider reforming superannuation, offered to Opposition finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds the opportunity for ‘tough conversations’ about superannuation. “Happy to,” responded Edmonds.
I understand that this dialogue has yet to commence but it indicates Willis’ desire to seek cross-party support to deal with the unsustainable drain on the Crown’s account of our current pension arrangements.
Readers will also be aware that Chris Hipkins made the call to back the Indian free-trade agreement, allowing the government to over-ride NZ First’s veto. Hipkins has also conceded he will not be walking away from National’s infrastructure projects, and has indicated he will not, entirely, abandon Erica Stanford’s education reforms.
Does this indicate that there is a desire for Brown’s grand coalition? Doesn’t it make economic logic for the two sensible parties to combine forces to resolve the otherwise unresolvable? They can share the blame for unpopular decisions, balance the books, and pave the way for a brighter future?
When Brown put this directly to Barbara Edmonds last week, the MP for Mana responded that, putting aside the different paths National and Labour wished to travel to achieve largely similar goals, she was aware that past grand coalitions resulted in a surge of support for the fringes. In Ireland, Australia, Germany and Italy, enduring alignments between the two major parties had been followed by the rise in extremist parties.
She is correct. But so is Brown. Many of the issues confronting our nation cannot be resolved by either party acting alone or in conjunction with their junior partners. The solution, perhaps, is a willingness for both parties to work together, but not in partnership, on those issues where bipartisanship is required.
We saw this in trade. There are hints of this in infrastructure and superannuation. The challenges facing New Zealand are considerable, and, well, I am not optimistic that we can avoid the trajectory predicted by Tytler’s warning; but if we are the sort of collaboration as envisioned by the Prime Minister of Auckland would be a good place to start.......The full article is published HERE
Damien Grant is an Auckland business owner, a member of the Taxpayers’ Union and a regular opinion contributor for Stuff, writing from a libertarian perspective
Meanwhile National ministers express frustration with NZ First’s refusal to tackle superannuation, and Act’s uncompromising desire to balance the budget.
Brown proposes a grand coalition. The largest party presumably would get the Prime Minister, the junior party Finance, and between them a Cabinet of competent rivals could tackle the hard decisions that successive governments have, since the fall of Ruth Richardson as Finance Minister in 1993, avoided.
MMP drives fiscal irresponsibility. The minor parties have authority without responsibility. NZ First can campaign on protecting pensions for millionaire retirees paid for with debt and win seats at the Cabinet table on the back of a reckless and unsustainable policy.
The Greens counter with free healthcare and dental paid for with a wealth tax they know Parliament will never pass even if Labour agrees to the free dental in order to ride in the Crown limousines one more time.
There is a quote, its origin unknown but inaccurately attributed to Scottish judge and writer, Alexander Tytler, the Lord Woodhouselee, who died in 1813.
Tytler wrote extensively on the limits of democracy and his ideas have been credited with ‘Tytler’s warning’, although there is no evidence he formulated the specific idea: A democracy will collapse once voters realise they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury.
MMP compounds this problem by allowing the segmentation of self-interested constituencies while the moderate centre becomes marginalised.
Those with the burden of balancing the competing claims find themselves in an impossible situation and we can see evidence of the current finance minister reaching across the aisle to see if there is an alternative to her coalition partners.
In the recent Mood of the Boardroom debate, Nicola Willis, clearly frustrated at Winston Peters’ reluctance to consider reforming superannuation, offered to Opposition finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds the opportunity for ‘tough conversations’ about superannuation. “Happy to,” responded Edmonds.
I understand that this dialogue has yet to commence but it indicates Willis’ desire to seek cross-party support to deal with the unsustainable drain on the Crown’s account of our current pension arrangements.
Readers will also be aware that Chris Hipkins made the call to back the Indian free-trade agreement, allowing the government to over-ride NZ First’s veto. Hipkins has also conceded he will not be walking away from National’s infrastructure projects, and has indicated he will not, entirely, abandon Erica Stanford’s education reforms.
Does this indicate that there is a desire for Brown’s grand coalition? Doesn’t it make economic logic for the two sensible parties to combine forces to resolve the otherwise unresolvable? They can share the blame for unpopular decisions, balance the books, and pave the way for a brighter future?
When Brown put this directly to Barbara Edmonds last week, the MP for Mana responded that, putting aside the different paths National and Labour wished to travel to achieve largely similar goals, she was aware that past grand coalitions resulted in a surge of support for the fringes. In Ireland, Australia, Germany and Italy, enduring alignments between the two major parties had been followed by the rise in extremist parties.
She is correct. But so is Brown. Many of the issues confronting our nation cannot be resolved by either party acting alone or in conjunction with their junior partners. The solution, perhaps, is a willingness for both parties to work together, but not in partnership, on those issues where bipartisanship is required.
We saw this in trade. There are hints of this in infrastructure and superannuation. The challenges facing New Zealand are considerable, and, well, I am not optimistic that we can avoid the trajectory predicted by Tytler’s warning; but if we are the sort of collaboration as envisioned by the Prime Minister of Auckland would be a good place to start.......The full article is published HERE
Damien Grant is an Auckland business owner, a member of the Taxpayers’ Union and a regular opinion contributor for Stuff, writing from a libertarian perspective
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