Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: The Taxpayers' Union's Chris Hipkins AI advert is brilliant campaigning

Right, so the question is whether the Taxpayers' Union has gone too far with its AI advert about Chris Hipkins.

If you haven't seen the ad yet, let me explain it. It's a short video that starts with a ginger-haired man in a suit and red tie sprinting down a suburban street. He kicks in a door and runs into a house where a family is having dinner. He grabs all their wallets from the table and runs off. Then he kicks in the door of another house. A woman is watching TV. He rushes in, takes her wallet and bolts out the door.

Next, he steals a wallet from a renovation site and then takes all the money lying on a table at a barbecue. After that, he runs back out onto the street, jumps into a clapped-out red Toyota, looks into the rear-view mirror and it's Chippy.

Then the ad says: "We can't afford Labour."

As you can imagine, commentators on the left are absolutely losing their minds over it. Hipkins has called it nasty and desperate, saying it shows how out of touch the rich boys who run the Taxpayers' Union are.

Frankly, I think it's brilliant.

I saw it weeks ago, funnily enough, before the Taxpayers' Union released it and I thought it was very funny the first time I watched it.

It doesn't cross any ethical lines. No one is going to think it's really Hipkins, not only because the AI actor doesn't actually look like him, but because the behaviour is so outrageously over the top. There's no way anyone could seriously believe this is Chris Hipkins. You'd have to be an idiot to think it was real.

The use of AI is also perfectly acceptable. In fact, political parties would be idiots not to use something this cheap and effective. And I think that's the key point here.

This is the most effective attack ad on Labour yet. It's a thousand times more effective than every National MP going on about "nine new taxes" as part of some 1995-style political strategy in the hope that someone will take the claim seriously.

The ad takes the idea that Chippy is after your money, which supporters of the message would argue is true, and exaggerates it to the point of being funny. Because it's funny, and because it's visual, it sticks.

Now, you might not like the Taxpayers' Union. You might not like its politics. You might not like its strategies. But you have to admit that it is one of the best organisations in the business at campaigning and making a political point with a bit of humour.

My advice to Chippy would be this: stop talking about the ad, mate, because you're only drawing attention to it. Thousands more people are now going to want to see it, and they're going to remember it because it's quite funny.

Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and radio broadcaster who hosts Newstalk ZB's weekday Drive-Time Show – where this article was sourced.