It is often said that Oppositions never win elections because governments lose them. In other words, if a government is unpopular enough it will lose an election, regardless of the calibre of the Opposition. 

That was certainly the case in 2023 when Labour was tossed out of office. The public mood then was far more that people had had enough of Labour and were keen to get rid of it, rather than a positive feeling for National. And as National's support has waned in recent months, and Labour's increased, it was beginning to look as though history might be set to repeat itself at this November's election. However, that may be about to change.

Until recently, Labour's policy of saying nothing and therefore keeping the focus squarely on the government and its perceived shortcomings looked to be working. It was not a new idea – it was the same approach Albanese's Labor Party successfully followed in Australia in the lead-up to its first election victory in 2022. To that extent, it was smart politics for Hipkins and New Zealand Labour to copy them.

And they have done so, almost to a fault. With only two exceptions – the Future Fund announced last October, and the capital gains tax hurriedly announced a couple of weeks later but only because some details had been leaked to the media – Labour has been a policy free zone since the last election. Its excuse has been that it is waiting for the government to release this year’s Budget so it can see the true state of the country's books before making policy commitments. However, given the likely dire government accounts, that simply means, if it is to be true to its word, that Labour's election policy offerings are likely to be very meagre and uninspiring indeed.

But it goes deeper than that. Labour will not even provide full details of the two policies it has announced so far. Earlier this week Labour admitted it cannot say until after the election which public assets could be transferred to the Future Fund, because it will not know until it assumes office which state owned enterprises may be subject to Treaty of Waitangi obligations. That argument simply does not wash – Labour has had all the months leading up to last October’s announcement, and the seven months since then, to find out the answers to those questions. Rubbing salt in the wound was Hipkins’ subsequent arrogant assertion that “I don’t think the public really care which companies are going to go in or not.”

And the obfuscatory explanations about how the annual three free doctors’ visits to be funded by the capital gains tax may work, let alone the technical details of the tax itself, show a similar disturbing unwillingness to fill in the policy details or let the public know how its policies might work.

In a similar vein, there is Labour’s muted response to the Finance Minister’s announcement that around 8,700 more public service jobs will go by 2029. It seems to have left most of the self-serving howling to its acolytes in the Public Service Association, which it is unlikely to do the cause much good. Perhaps it is because, deep down, although it could never say it, Labour knows that the public service bloat of the Ardern years was unsustainable and that substantial restructuring was necessary and overdue. It probably also senses that outside the public service citadel of Wellington, reducing the size of the public service strikes a positive chord with voters.

Labour’s problem in trying to appear responsible and realistic about its election policy commitments, unlike the naive optimism of its predecessor, is that it ends up looking insipid and unconvincing. Moreover, and perhaps more seriously, the vacuum of its silence has left the field open to its potential partners in government, the Greens and Te Pati Māori to fill with a raft of expensive and far less credible and responsible policies. Although they are neither Labour policies nor ones it would readily seek to implement, the risk for Labour is that, to its detriment, because of its silence, it becomes defined by the policies of the Greens and Te Pati Māori, and therefore probably less electable.

Commentators often say that around the world at present it is not a good time to be in government. That would tend to support the “Governments lose rather than Oppositions win” line of argument and would explain Labour sticking to its policy silence. It looks to have calculated that, faced with a government whose popularity is declining, its best policy is to promise as little as possible so as not to risk alienating potential support.

There are, however, two problems with maintaining that approach. First, despite the government’s waning popularity, all the opinion polls over the last two-and-a-half years, and particularly since late last year, have shown the Coalition with the numbers to win re-election, albeit with a narrow majority. Second, Labour’s two policy announcements to date have had little impact on its public standing and there is mounting frustration at its policy silence.

The risk it faces now is that if starts to release a plethora of policy in the wake of next week’s Budget it will not be taken seriously. On the other hand, continuing with the too clever by half approach of trying to present so small an electoral target as to be near invisible for as long as possible risks ending up backfiring spectacularly.

And voters may simply conclude that all this self-imagined clever strategy really means is that the party is bereft of, or afraid of new ideas, and ill-prepared to return to government.

Rawiri Waititi is absolutely correct when he says there will be no one-term government without Te Pati Māori. At no point since the last election have Labour and the Green Party been polling strongly enough to contemplate forming a government without the inclusion of Te Pati Māori. And even if Te Pati Māori were to be involved, there have only been three occasions, according to the polls, since the last election when the left bloc would have had the numbers to form a government, were there to have been an election.

The problem with Waititi's assertion is not the accuracy of his observation, but rather the sheer unlikelihood of its being able to be achieved. One of the main reasons why Waititi’s claim is not viable is Te Pati Māori itself. Since the high point of wresting the Tamaki Makarau seat from Labour in last year’s by-election the party has been engaged in its own self-destruction, culminating in this week’s announcement by Tai Tokerau MP Mariameno Kapa-Kingi that she is leaving to form her own party. This is despite her having won a Court battle earlier this year to be reinstated to Te Pati Māori, after the party expelled her and Takuta Ferris last year.

With speculation swirling about the status of other Te Pati Māori MPs, it is still far from clear what state the party will be in to fight the election later this year, let alone contribute to any process of government formation post-election. The dysfunction that has gripped the party over the last few months is showing no signs of abating or being resolved, raising doubts about its capacity to conduct a credible election campaign, let alone remain a viable political force afterwards.

But even if Te Pati Māori can put its divisions behind it, which still seems unlikely, the bigger question arises as to whether Labour would be prepared to accommodate it within a governing arrangement. Although Labour looks to have no path to government without Te Pati Māori, Chris Hipkins has so far been disparaging of Te Pati Māori’s readiness to be part of a government and keeps refusing to say whether the two parties could work together.

He knows that if he were to embrace Te Pati Māori alongside the Greens, he would potentially risk shedding more conservative Labour supporters, most probably to New Zealand First, thus outweighing any potential gain. Yet he also knows the logical truth of Waititi’s assertion. Nevertheless, as increasingly seems his wont on so many other issues, Hipkins will continue to sit on the fence for as long as possible.

At the same time, Labour is actively campaigning to regain the Māori electorates. It has assembled an impressive slate of candidates to contest those electorates, which will mean the outcome in none of those seats can be taken for granted. But if Labour wins all those seats, which it says is its objective, it may be counter-productive to its overall election prospects.

Unless accompanied by a substantial increase in its party vote, Labour’s winning all or most of the Māori electorates would simply mean a likely reduction in the number of list seats it wins, thus not helping its overall chances to form a government. And if Te Pati Māori loses all its electorate seats, all party votes which it attracts will be wasted, as it is unlikely to cross the 5% party vote threshold.

Labour’s Māori electorates strategy therefore looks to be driven more by a desire for vengeance than common sense. Given that its strategy is driven by Willie Jackson, that is probably no surprise, but it is unlikely to enhance Labour’s prospects of leading the next government. It has never come to terms with the reasons for its rejection in most of the Māori electorates at the last election. Despite the impressive candidates it has selected to contest the Māori electorates this year, Labour still seems not to have learned the lesson so bluntly delivered at the Tamaki Makarau by-election last year, that it no longer has any historic right to assume those seats are its own.

Indeed, the arrogance which Jackson typifies so strongly may well prove to be one of the strongest factors in favour of Te Pati Māori, especially amongst younger Māori voters, fed up with years of Labour’s lazy indifference to their concerns. They are unlikely to take kindly to Labour’s renewed interest in the Māori electorates, nor to any suggestion that their future advancement lies inherently with a Labour-led government.

Nevertheless, none of these machinations detracts from the fundamental point Waititi has been making. But each contributes to making it even more unlikely that his ambition to see a one-term government can be realised.

 

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon describes the "food for fuel" deal he has just concluded with Singapore as "world leading". While that language may sound unnecessarily Trumpist, the arrangement is certainly a positive one to be celebrated.

It reflects the ongoing strength of the relationship between Singapore and New Zealand and is a pragmatic and hopefully long-term response to the difficult international situation at present. Both countries are committing to trading commodities that each need, to their mutual benefit.

Singapore’s pragmatism since the time of Lee Quan Yew in the pursuit of growth and prosperity and advancing the interests of the city-state is legendary. So it was no real surprise that it should have shown such an interest in reaching a deal like this. Especially as since the end of World War II Singapore has consistently cited New Zealand and Australia as its two most significant regional partners.

But the pragmatism that underpins Luxon’s deal has also been a consistent strand in New Zealand’s trade policy over recent decades. Again, there is a similarity with Singapore. Both countries have had to deal with changes to British foreign policy that have adversely affected them. In Singapore’s case, it was Britain’s winding down and eventual abandonment of its East of Suez policy in the 1960s. For New Zealand, it was Britain’s decision to join the European Economic Community in 1973.

Faced with the double whammy of both losing long-term automatic access for sheep and dairy products to the British market and the first oil shock after the Yom Kippur war in 1973, New Zealand, as a small trading nation, faced rapid economic adjustment. The end of the guaranteed British market meant New Zealand had to develop and break into established markets elsewhere to sell its primary products and other manufactured goods. And that meant having to consider new mutual trading relationships.

Ironically, in the light of the current international situation, one of its earliest efforts involved Iran. In 1974, the Rowling government hosted the Shah of Iran on a state visit to New Zealand during which agreement was reached on New Zealand exporting lamb, cheese and wool to Iran in return for Iranian oil being exported to New Zealand.

It proved to be a highly successful arrangement. By the mid-1970s, Iran was purchasing around 60% of New Zealand’s lamb exports, and New Zealand had stability of oil supplies from Iran. However, it fell apart over the years after the 1979 Iranian Revolution, because the impact of international sanctions on the new Islamic regime caused severe foreign exchange shortages for Iran, making it a less reliable trading partner.

In a similar vein, but much less successfully, New Zealand reached an agreement with the Soviet Union in the early 1980s to trade dairy products for Lada cars. However, the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991, not to mention the inferior quality of Lada cars, put paid to this arrangement.

By contrast, Luxon’s deal with Singapore looks more soundly based. For a start, there is a measure of political stability in both countries which means it is likely to endure, whoever is in government in either Singapore or Wellington. Moreover, there is a historical dimension to New Zealand’s relationship with Singapore that runs deeper than its relationship with both Iran and the Soviet Union at the time those deals were concluded. And because of that, the ongoing relationship is much more multi-faceted.

Over the years, many New Zealand politicians have spoken enviously of Singapore’s economic development and sought to apply its lessons to New Zealand’s somewhat less stellar economic development and resilience. Since 2000, Singapore and New Zealand have had a free trade agreement, the Closer Economic Partnership, and the "food for fuel" arrangement will be incorporated into this agreement. Again, this should provide greater certainty for its future viability than the earlier agreements.

It seems likely that the United States’ demolition of the rules-based approach that has underpinned international relations since 1945 will lead to more direct country-to-country and regional economic and political arrangements. In that regard, New Zealand’s experience in reaching this deal with Singapore should serve it well in reaching similar deals with other regional partners.

This arrangement is not just a “nice to have”. Rather, the "food for fuel" deal is a vital part of the jigsaw of our future approach to trade and international relations.

Taken together, the “food for fuel” deal and the free trade agreement signed with India earlier on Luxon’s current overseas trip, make last week one of the most significant for a New Zealand government in recent years.

 

It should not come as a surprise that Prime Minister Luxon favoured New Zealand taking a more positive response to the United States' attacks on Iran. Luxon's seeming inability from the outset of the conflict to clearly articulate New Zealand's position raised early suspicions that he would have preferred to take a stronger line in support of the United States and was not entirely comfortable New Zealand was not doing so. 

The recently released exchange of emails between Luxon and Foreign Minister Winston Peters shows that at the very least Luxon raised the question of New Zealand taking a stronger line. It could just as clearly be inferred from the emails that Luxon was actively pushing back against the more cautious approach Peters and Foreign Affairs were advocating and wanted New Zealand to position itself much more explicitly in the United States’ camp. His claim to have been misrepresented because he was merely testing the waters is hard to take seriously.

Either way, it leaves the impression that Luxon’s muddled explanations at press conferences were because he did not fully agree with his own government’s decisions. That, in itself, is an extraordinary reflection on the Prime Minister’s standing within the coalition.

One of the ironies of this current situation is that it is Peters who seems to be pushing the moderate line. In his earlier stints as Foreign Minister in the Clark and Ardern governments Peters generally favoured a more pro-United States line than the government of the time was prepared to take. Nevertheless, he will feel vindicated in his present stance by the Ipsos poll result showing 87% of New Zealanders agree that New Zealand should avoid direct military involvement in the conflict.

Aside from the differences of opinion between Luxon and Peters and their respective roles in situations like this that the emails reveal, there is another disturbing aspect to this incident. In the normal business of government free and frank exchanges of views and advice often occur at a personal level between Ministers. That is expected and a standard part of the way the government works. What is unusual, and arguably unwise in this instance, given the discoverability of written communications under both the Official Information Act and the Archives Act, is that sensitive exchanges were happening through written communications, not face-to-face discussions. It was inevitable that, one way or another, they would make their way into the public arena at some point.

In that regard, Luxon has a point about Peters’ judgement in releasing the emails, but Luxon was also at fault in responding to them the way he did. For his part, Peters could equally argue that his proactive release of the material simply acknowledged the inevitability of it becoming public at some future, potentially more politically embarrassing, point. But both overlook the reality that both could have prevented the uproar that has now occurred by just talking directly to each other about it. Common-sense, let alone political judgement, should have strongly suggested that.

At a wider level, this incident says much about the state of relations within the coalition government, or at least one part of it, six months from the election. It does not mean that the coalition is on the point of falling apart, or that it will not be renewed if the centre-right bloc has the numbers after the election. (Peters has, after all, as recently as last week unusually emphatically ruled out working with Labour to form a government.) But it does confirm, backed up by its recent surge in polling support, that New Zealand First is clearly staking out the ground now to be a far more influential, if not dominant, player in a future centre-right coalition, and that National is having some difficulty in getting used to that idea.

Peters and New Zealand First will obviously carry on with that strategy until at least the election, much to National’s frustration and embarrassment. And if it continues to respond the way it has so far, with public rebukes and put downs, National will carry on being seen as ineffectual in dealing with the far wilier Peters. Moreover, it will continue to shed disillusioned former supporters to New Zealand First, now more confident than ever that they can support New Zealand First seemingly without the risk of putting Labour in power.

Therefore, the best way for National to counter Peters’ game of being part of the government and collective responsibility only as it suits him – a novel constitutional idea – is to lock him more firmly into what the government is doing, rather than shun him the way Luxon is seeking to at present. Their aim should be to stifle Peters’ opportunities to credibly distance himself from the government with the impunity he has been.

As far as Iran is concerned, National should be going overboard to make sure Peters is key to and locked into, publicly and privately, all the government’s foreign policy and economic decisions. This would leave him little room to sneer at and shun them, the way he has been able to do, claiming that that he has not been fully involved. Perversely, the more National seeks to marginalise Peters and New Zealand First, the more it strengthens and emboldens them. So, perhaps it is time for National to pick up Michael Corleone’s line from The Godfather Part II, “keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.”

For New Zealanders generally, who will not be all that interested in the minutiae of these events, the more worrying and tedious prospect is that more of what has been happening between National and New Zealand First can be expected in the lead-up to the election, and potentially afterwards, if the coalition is renewed. Their bottom-line general view, with which it is hard to disagree, will be that this is not what a good and stable government should look like.