Politics, eh? Bloody hell!
There were no shy Tories after all. No late rally. Not even a solid base of provincial blue seats to cushion the blow. Just a Jacinda-shaped tornado and a 30-point swing. Brutal.
Gerry Brownlee’s face was the picture of the night – you’d need a heart of stone not to feel for the guy. The lip sorely wanted to tremble, the eyes threatened to mist over in grief; but the old stager knew that with the cameras rolling and most of the National front bench seemingly AWOL, he had to front up to the media jackals, and wheel out the cliches from the How To Respond When The Electorate Hands You Your Arse On A Plate handbook.
There was talk of reflecting and reconnecting, but there was at least acceptance of his personal defeat. Judith Collins seems firmly ensconced in the initial stage of grief: denial. Her claim that National’s internal polling had them at nearly 40% just before the second lockdown is either complete bollocks or a sign that National needs a new pollster. Her disingenuous claim that she only put her hand up reluctantly for the leadership role because the party was desperate hardly stacks up, given that she ‘reluctantly’ put her hat in the ring twice before – when John Key and then Bill English resigned. Her naked coveting of the role infuriated her erstwhile colleagues Kaye, Bennett and Adams.
Yet her most preposterous argument emerged today: apparently, all those National voters in rural seats voted Labour tactically to keep the Greens out of government. Yeah, right. Or as Michael Cullen once put it: we won, you lost, eat that.
There are already elements of hubris in this defeat for Judith Collins. In one of the livelier debates, she scoffed at Jacinda’s suggestion that politics didn’t have to be a bloodsport. “Bring it on!” yelled Crusher. So Ardern, with a shrug, dusted off the stardust, and watched her newly-expanded caucus and army of loyal activists feast on the National carcass. The blood on the floor is all blue, and if it were sport, the fight would have been stopped at about 8pm. The supposed firewall of rural and provincial citadels fell quickly and meekly: Rangitata, Wairarapa, East Coast. Chris Bishop’s media mates could not save him from the red tsunami, and when a seat as totemic as Ilam turns red, well goodness…
This result probably bodes well for Joe Biden
Let’s face it: the final polling underestimated the left vote. The last 5 polls were 3% too low for Labour and 5% too high for National. Apply that to the US Presidential election and Biden would be looking at a double digit landslide. What’s that, you say? US pollsters are different from NZ pollsters? Well, not really. In a globalised world, political parties and political analysts all talk to each other. After getting it wrong with Brexit, Trump 2016 and Australia last year by underestimating the turnout among certain demographics, it’s quite plausible that the pollsters here had overcorrected. The record estimates turnout of 83% suggests that the long awaited leftwing youthquake did make an appearance. And many older white National voters probably just stayed home in stoic acceptance of the inevitable defeat.
It ought to get worse for National before it gets better
The special votes tend to lean left. Three years ago, in a much more evenly-balanced election between left and right blocs, National lost three further seats when the specials came in. Shane Reti is extremely unlikely to hold on to Whangarei with a wafer-thin majority of 142. The Nats will be similarly nervous about Maungakiekie, Invercargill and even Northland, all with majorities well below 1000.
Collins has commissioned a review of her party’s campaign. That’s worth an ironic cheer of its own given how much she has excoriated Labour for its reviews and working groups. And she has already hobbled it by declaring that policies were not to blame. Yes they were. Leaving aside Paul Goldsmith’s shonky Maths, only the most tone deaf rightwing party would fixate on reducing crown debt as the keystone of their Covid recovery. When a ‘socialist’ like Boris Johnson is spending money like water to keep UK Plc afloat, and with unemployment off the scale globally, talk of living within means is a pretty grotesque misreading of the room.
It will be interesting to see the post-election demographic breakdown when it comes out. I’m picking Jacinda to be the first Labour leader since Kirk or even Fraser to win among over 65s. The dismissive tone of many rightwing commentators, decrying the need for lockdowns and airily declaring that only already sick elderly were at risk from Covid, was a pretty contemptuous two fingers to the most solid tranche of National voters in the country.
Labour should seriously consider a coalition with the Greens anyway
Make no mistake, Labour has its own mandate. But John Key reached out to the Maori Party when he didn’t really need their votes, feeling that it would make him look consultative and inclusive. And many of the policies that were stymied by NZ First in the last three years were policies championed by both Labour and the Greens, such as Auckland light rail. After such an amazing night for the left, why not send a strong message of unity and cooperation? And finally, allowing James Shaw to continue as Climate Change Minister is just perfect trolling of grumpy old farmers.
This result is seismic. The only other comparable swing I have witnessed was Blair in 1997. And Jacinda is just as ruthless. Labour’s relatively light policy platform, which irritated the media and the opposition, was simply a smart calculation that Labour was in a strong position because of her leadership and communication rather than ideology, policy or delivery. So why open up another flank for attack in a debate? It left National and Collins chasing the game, and ultimately chasing their tails.
Sideswipe Bob 