Our PM Jacinda Ardern (and the government)

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#2886818 16-Mar-2022 05:57

quickymart:

My opinion:

National lost in 2017 because after three terms of John Key and co, people wanted a change, and a lot of people saw that in Jacinda (young, fresh, etc). Plus Winston was the kingmaker then, and he wasn't interested in going with National as (from memory) they treated him poorly re his pension (or was it tax returns?) etc.

National lost in 2020 because the Government did a fantastic job managing the coronavirus pandemic, and we had (and still have) one of the lowest death tolls in the world. Plus, their leader at the time was highly polarising and was not personable enough to appeal to the majority of the public. In fact, I think Judith put a lot of voters off National, and they went elsewhere.

As to 2023? I really think it could go either way, to be honest. But as you say, a lot of time still to pass between now and then. Anything could happen.

Actually National had a bigger percentage of the vote in the 2017 election than in the previous election. I don't think you can really say people wanted a change. It's was solely Winston being Winston. He ignored the electorate as a whole and betrayed the people who voted for him.

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#2886819 16-Mar-2022 06:05

44% < 47%

GV27

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#2886820 16-Mar-2022 06:22

quickymart:

My opinion:

National lost in 2017 because after three terms of John Key and co, people wanted a change, and a lot of people saw that in Jacinda (young, fresh, etc). Plus Winston was the kingmaker then, and he wasn't interested in going with National as (from memory) they treated him poorly re his pension (or was it tax returns?) etc.

I feel like the enormity of what Labour promised as policy changes in 2017 on basically all fronts is often understated, given they abandoned or failed on almost every single one. People are extremely quick to point to 'fiscal holes' or basic spreadsheeting stuff-ups in National's workings (which shouldn't be there, granted), but the sheer brazenness of promising almost everything under the sun that you had zero capability or intent to deliver for me is the real scandal in the 2017 election, arguably far worse than any other previous election scandal to do with spending or donations, simply because it relied on the core weakness of democratic systems of getting people to vote for you and then abandoning the pretext on which you did so.

To give in a non-political context, I'd call it a bait-and-switch. We don't tolerate companies who do it, but we seem to be fine with the absurdity of a major party just promising everything under the sun and delivering almost nothing. I mean if both sides are able to do this now then game on, I guess, but it's easy to be a fresh face and paint the incumbents as out of touch if your policies aren't constrained by reality or feasibility. You expect that from minor parties, not the big two.

Yes, much is made of Winston as a handbrake, but as discussed, many Labour policies were stuffed before they got near a cabinet level, while some were outright fibs to begin with. Yes, Kiwisaver failed, but how many people remember the price caps being raised right after the election because it turned out the costings Twyford had used and been challenged on repeatedly as out of date ended up being out of date?

As to why National lost in 2020; Collins wasn't an inspiring or fresh face, the policies have been recycled (and look to have been recycled again) and they were plagued by months on infighting. If they hadn't rolled Bridges they would have had a chance and if it weren't for Covid, they would have won. But they did, and they just flat out lost because they weren't a party in a state to govern. No excuses that time around.

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#2886831 16-Mar-2022 07:18

quickymart:
My opinion:

National lost in 2017 because after three terms of John Key and co, people wanted a change, and a lot of people saw that in Jacinda (young, fresh, etc). Plus Winston was the kingmaker then, and he wasn't interested in going with National as (from memory) they treated him poorly re his pension (or was it tax returns?) etc.

National lost in 2020 because the Government did a fantastic job managing the coronavirus pandemic, and we had (and still have) one of the lowest death tolls in the world. Plus, their leader at the time was highly polarising and was not personable enough to appeal to the majority of the public. In fact, I think Judith put a lot of voters off National, and they went elsewhere.

As to 2023? I really think it could go either way, to be honest. But as you say, a lot of time still to pass between now and then. Anything could happen.

Winston went with Labour because they were willing to give him a $3b slush fund of taxpayer money for Shane Jones to spend as he saw fit. It was fairly blatant that NZ 1st we’re going to spend it where they thought it would get them votes at the next election.

We will never know the actual circumstances of what was agreed between NZ 1st and Labour as they refused to release the agreement, not long after claiming they were going to be a transparent government. They quickly became the opposite.

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#2886858 16-Mar-2022 08:05

Technofreak: It's was solely Winston being Winston. He ignored the electorate as a whole and betrayed the people who voted for him.

NZ First voters vote for Peters to make that decision. There tends to be some upset regardless of which party he chooses to go with on the day.

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#2886878 16-Mar-2022 08:31

networkn:

I disagree. The oppositions entire focus is pretty much holding the Government to account. They oppose. It's in the name. Look at the number of things Labour opposed which they are now doing the same things for?

At the right time the opposition should deliver it's vision for how it would run the country so voters can choose.

The Government should be spending the VASTEST majority of it's time executing the policy it promised, and running the country. When the Government regularly spends more time focused on the opposition, their priorities are skewed and right now the country needs all the Governments focus to be on NZ Post Covid. If the Government delivers on it's goals, is innovative or at least show they have a coherent and plausible plan, they shouldn't need to worry too much about the opposition.

The problem for the Government, is that if you take away Covid, and Terror attacks, then what is left? People start looking at what was promised vs delivered, what the current state of the country is. I suspect that is why the government is so focused on what National did or didn't do.

They won't win another election bagging National.

We have very different versions of why National lost the election obviously.

Ive not noticed any excess bagging of National. If the Opposition can bag and/or hold a Government to account, the Government of the day can respond.

Yes, an Opposition does need to deliver something. But preferably not a vision, it needs to be a plan, with policies. When National was voted in, it had no policies. I looked that up based on previous discussion in one of these threads. When they lost it was the same. Both parties need to deliver plans and policies

If you took away Covid what is left? Hard to answer that given the economic effect of it, and the interruption given the cost. Kiwibuild was a fail as it was too late, as they were already unaffordable. There have been a raft of RMA changes so now we have a building boom, I consider that adequate. AFAIK there have been a number of things they have implanted, no doubt there is a list somewhere I can check out. However its impossible to know what would have happened if there was no Covid, so its about looking forward to a reset for NZ.

End of the day, for once, both parties need a plan not some ideological vision that we will grow the economy. And policies to match that plan, rough timelines.

GV's light rail thats still not here, but Chris Luxon has pushed that back also, so it begs the question, is opposing meaningful? Its a vote getter, but whoever wins, needs to back that up, assuming we have a largely uninterrupted period ahead.

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#2886880 16-Mar-2022 08:34

quickymart:

As to 2023? I really think it could go either way, to be honest. But as you say, a lot of time still to pass between now and then. Anything could happen.

It can. The Govt will be banned for housing crisis even though it already existed, todays inflation, fuel prices, and a lot of the public will lap that up, as the public often wants what they want in their personal lives. Head winds for sure.

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#2886899 16-Mar-2022 08:59

Technofreak:

quickymart:

My opinion:

National lost in 2017 because after three terms of John Key and co, people wanted a change, and a lot of people saw that in Jacinda (young, fresh, etc). Plus Winston was the kingmaker then, and he wasn't interested in going with National as (from memory) they treated him poorly re his pension (or was it tax returns?) etc.

National lost in 2020 because the Government did a fantastic job managing the coronavirus pandemic, and we had (and still have) one of the lowest death tolls in the world. Plus, their leader at the time was highly polarising and was not personable enough to appeal to the majority of the public. In fact, I think Judith put a lot of voters off National, and they went elsewhere.

As to 2023? I really think it could go either way, to be honest. But as you say, a lot of time still to pass between now and then. Anything could happen.

Actually National had a bigger percentage of the vote in the 2017 election than in the previous election. I don't think you can really say people wanted a change. It's was solely Winston being Winston. He ignored the electorate as a whole and betrayed the people who voted for him.

That's true, but I guess my point was (maybe poorly explained) they did a lot better polling-wise and votes-wise under Jacinda than they had done under any of their previous leaders, which counts for something, surely? If Winston had gone with National, they would have won a fourth term, but I always thought that was fairly unlikely, and Bill English (to me) didn't come across as a terribly inspiring leader, whereas John Key was quite different.

Disclaimer: I've never voted for National.

GV27

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#2886926 16-Mar-2022 09:36

tdgeek:

However its impossible to know what would have happened if there was no Covid, so its about looking forward to a reset for NZ.

We can infer that by what happened pre-Covid, such as ruling out CGT forever, two and a half years of striking out on Light Rail and Kiwibuild and no consequences for ministers who presided over giant messes.

From memory Twyford was even promoted ahead of the 2020 election.

Realistically Covid was a get-out-of-jail card that they played incredibly well. But using it to excuse the almost full-term of mistakes they made on a near-constant basis up to that point is inviting revisionism.

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#2886931 16-Mar-2022 09:42

tdgeek:

Yes, an Opposition does need to deliver something. But preferably not a vision, it needs to be a plan, with policies. When National was voted in, it had no policies. I looked that up based on previous discussion in one of these threads. When they lost it was the same. Both parties need to deliver plans and policies

When National was first voted in they had policies, but they were all tied and dependant on their #1 policy of returning to surplus.

At the 2017 Election, if you removed all the fantasy policies Labour made they were never going to deliver, then the policies and promises of both parties were extremely similar. One had an extra 500M in spending on x and the other on Y. The child welfare targets were higher for National, and Labour despite having the PM as MP for children hasn't made any significant progress, and there are more people in emergency housing, and waiting lists are longer than 4 years ago. All the aid agencies in NZ are reporting they have never been under more pressure to assist, which flys in the face of Labour's own reports that people are better off than they were 4 years ago.

If you took away Covid what is left? Hard to answer that given the economic effect of it, and the interruption given the cost. Kiwibuild was a fail as it was too late, as they were already unaffordable. There have been a raft of RMA changes so now we have a building boom, I consider that adequate. AFAIK there have been a number of things they have implanted, no doubt there is a list somewhere I can check out. However its impossible to know what would have happened if there was no Covid, so its about looking forward to a reset for NZ.

Kiwibuild was a failure for many reasons, and it's disingenuous to suggest it wasn't largely incompetence, poor planning and stupidly impossible targets (no-one could build 100K houses in 10 years, even my 14 year old nephew could do the math on that and see it was crazy). What was particularly galling was the continuation of Labour to claim they were on target, years after they had made no progress and the number of houses to build a day had risen well beyond impossible to meet the target. Jacinda should have fired Tywford long before he was demoted, but instead gave him an arguably more important role in transport which he then went on to behave in a similarly clueless and bullish manner. It wasn't just about the cost of the houses themselves either, a number of clients kids enrolled for the houses but noped out of it pretty much immediately after inspecting the houses as they were 'unliveable' because they were impractically designed, poorly laid out etc. When those kids looked at the difference in price between KB and open market houses, for 50-60K more they could have a home they were happy and more comfortable to live in.

When the opposition took the Government to task over Kiwibuild and its miserable failure (and unsurprisingly STILL no costs published from the most transparent Government ever), their entire response was 'well National didn't build any'. That's not an acceptable response by any stretch of the imagination (Nor true actually, since some National built houses were bought by the Government and rebranded as Kiwibuild homes).

I only know two housing developers, but they aren't building *more* houses right now. Most of the extra buildings I have seen are people who have decided because they aren't travelling, they are going to renovate and or upgrade and I've seen a fair bit of that among friends, family and clients. I've never heard a single mention of the RMA in that decision-making process, though I am no expert and it could be a factor in the overall boom, though I suspect less than has been suggested.

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#2886935 16-Mar-2022 09:44

GV27:

We can infer that by what happened pre-Covid, such as ruling out CGT forever, two and a half years of striking out on Light Rail and Kiwibuild and no consequences for ministers who presided over giant messes.

From memory Twyford was even promoted ahead of the 2020 election.

Realistically Covid was a get-out-of-jail card that they played incredibly well. But using it to excuse the almost full-term of mistakes they made on a near-constant basis up to that point is inviting revisionism.

Have you checked Chris Luxon position re the Light Rail?

Covid wasnt an idea, it was forced on all of us

While the below will probably be bagged, many things have changed. So its not quite the zero implementations thats often mentioned here

https://www.labour.org.nz/our-record

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#2886936 16-Mar-2022 09:44

tdgeek:

It can. The Govt will be banned for housing crisis even though it already existed, todays inflation, fuel prices, and a lot of the public will lap that up, as the public often wants what they want in their personal lives. Head winds for sure.

Do you accept that the housing crisis got significantly worse and house affordability is/was the worst it's ever been, since Labour took office?

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#2886938 16-Mar-2022 09:47

tdgeek:

Have you checked Chris Luxon position re the Light Rail?

It's not a National policy. There was no light rail in the National 2017 transport plan to my knowledge.

tdgeek

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#2886942 16-Mar-2022 09:57

networkn:

Do you accept that the housing crisis got significantly worse and house affordability is/was the worst it's ever been, since Labour took office?

It has thats correct. Its been heading in that direction for a long time. Irregardless of who won 2017 it kept rising. As it did with Key as it did with Clarke.

It depends if you mean that prices kept rising since 2017 because of Labour, or whether it will have risen anyway.

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#2886945 16-Mar-2022 10:00

networkn:

tdgeek:

Have you checked Chris Luxon position re the Light Rail?

It's not a National policy. There was no light rail in the National 2017 transport plan to my knowledge.

I said position, not policy. He is the leader, an election not that far off, so for those who have an interest in Light Rail and where that may sit with a new National Government, its a guide to where LR goes in the future.

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