Kia ora to who ever the new Labour Leader will be after the 3 week leadership battle set to take place before the November conference.
Before all the right wing pundits and manipulators start bleating their crooked and self-serving advice the way Fran O’Sullivan, John Armstrong, David Farrar, Matthew Hooton and Cameron Slater did with David Shearer, could I offer my humble advice on what the next Labour Leader should do in their first 100 days?
New Zealanders are screaming for a political opposition to counter this terrible Government. Shearer’s inexperience and inability to articulate a left wing economic and social agenda that could be championed was his greatest failing. I don’t wish to dwell on Shearer’s leadership, but suffice to say his appointment was a factional move to block Cunliffe.
Shearer’s appointment was not about who could be the best leader for Labour, his appointment was to satisfy the ambitions of those who empowered him. Such craven drives were always going to be a poor servant and stupid master.
The next leader of Labour will be voted in, not by the Caucus coven who are more focused on their own personal welfare, but by the long suffering members who never see their left wing aspirations given policy wings and the poor Unions who stump up all the cash only to get watered down employment legislation as thanks.
The next Labour Leader will be a genuine leader of the people. It was this that terrified Patrick Gower, John Armstrong, Josie Pagani and other right wing pundits when Labour members and affiliates forced through the democratization of the Labour Party at the last conference.
Remember this is how John Armstrong was referring to it as little as last Saturday in his last bullshit column trying to prop up Shearer…
Labour’s annual conference is little over two months away. Much effort will go into ensuring its agenda or – more to the point – the agenda of those uncompromising delegates hellbent on undertaking kamikaze missions on the party’s electoral credibility simply for the sake of political correctness, do not hold sway or equally end up being used as cannon fodder in conference votes by those with more nefarious motives – as occurred at last year’s gathering.
…the democratization of Labour is seen as “uncompromising delegates hellbent on undertaking kamikaze missions on the party’s electoral credibility simply for the sake of political correctness” and let’s not forget the “nefarious motives” that Armstrong ludicrously refers to. Armstrong and the corporate media he fronts for fear a genuine leader of the Left, so let’s not disappoint the bastards.
Here are the things I think a Labour Leader needs to put in place in the first 100 days.
Social Media Team
Fran Mold as press secretary oversaw the most damaging outbreak of Civil war on the blogs against Shearer. I’ve never spoken to Fran Mold once beyond an email asking to interview Shearer. I run one of the largest left wing blogs in NZ, Lynn Prentice hasn’t spoken to her and he runs THE largest left wing blog. Labour are woeful at their social media tactics and strategy. Obama’s team had constant contact with the progressive blogs during his last election, yet Fran’s advice at the time seemed to amount to having senior MPs attack and slag the blogs off when they met in Wellington.
“Blogs,who cares about blogs” – Clayton Cosgrove
“The blogs don’t get to vote in the labour party, so we don’t pay much consideration to it” – Andrew Little
“I don’t read blogs” they are “nonsense” – David Shearer
The next Labour Leader must know that the msm will give them no honeymoon, will attack them and twist everything for their own benefit, so Labour must talk past the MSM via social media directly to the electorate. Labour need a social media team that operates directly out of the leaders office and it needs to be sharp and fast and quick in feeding the 25 hour social media cycle (I say 25 hours because it is never ending) before they hand anything over to the Press Gallery who are always going to side with the interests of the wealthy against anything progressive Labour announce.
When TV3 are bringing a far right hate merchant like Cameron Slater onto their show to discuss Shaerer leaving, you appreciate the need to develop a totally different means of communicating to voters beyond relying on corporate media.
There is no centre ground
The demise of United Future is symbolic of there being no centre ground in NZ politics any longer. The inequality between rich and poor has accelerated under this Government, listening to the wealthy is what the media does (the wealthy are the ones with the money to buy the things the advertising pays for on corporate media, so their interests are paramount), but the next Labour Leader needs to reach out to the 800 000 NZers who were enrolled but who didn’t bother voting for Labour.
Cunliffe is the only Labour Party MP to articulate in his first vision speeches that Labour’s dependence on the Free Market doctrine of Milton Friedman was the largest voter turn off, that voters saw no real difference between National and Labour economically and that since the global financial meltdown where much of the rights treasured philosophical beliefs turned out to be quicksand, voters wanted a new economic vision articulated.
The next Labour Leader needs some big left wing Keynesian economic ideas from it’s own political past. Mass state house rebuilds, totally free education, far more investment in early childhood. The ideas have to be big so they can build a vision of value. After 6 years of being told by John Key what the Government can’t do for NZers, the people will want to hear from the next Labour leader what Government can do for them.
Unions – give theme some bloody teeth!
After 9 years of Labour under Helen Clarke, the Union movement was actually weaker! The next Labour Leader must give real power back to Unions at the negotiating table. We know Unions are the largest mechanism available to redress inequality and they need teeth to force bosses to pay a living wage. The media are going to be attacking any move to the left, so the next leader should embrace that and talk up the importance of unions in securing working people their livelihoods.
When 29 men can go to work and die at Pike River Mine and the regulation is so pitiful that no one is held accountable for it, you know the pendulum has gone too far to the right. It’s time to swing that pendulum back.
The horror story of deaths on workplaces, especially forestry is an issue the CTU have refused to let go off, their recommendations and their views must go beyond the watered down version Simon Bridges has offered.
New blood, more women and greater diversity
There is so much dead wood in Labour you could rebuild Christchurch three times over. Labour must be the representative face of the people and Labour needs new blood to look like the people. The candidacy of Efeso Collins in Manukau East, Kate Sutton gaining a high place on the Party list and Stuart Nash’s important crusade in the provinces are all examples of better candidates who need the Leaders blessing.
Deals need to be cut with MANA over the Maori seats to ensure those electorates go to progressive parties and not the sell out Maori Party and the social media network should be seen as a recruitment tool for Labour youth. The diversity expressed by Soraiya Daud needs to be embraced, not rejected and stronger female candidates promoted. When I pointed out at the GCSB Public meeting that Helen Kelly needed to be in Parliament, the audience roared their approval.
Labour’s strength is its diversity, the next Labour Leader needs to promote and understand this.
NZ – generate a new fierce independent vision
The mass appeal of the anti-GCSB protests has been driven be a fierce independence. The idea that Key is signing domestic spy powers over to America cuts deep to the heart of many NZers and the next Labour Leader needs to espouse a new vision on these issues in the way David Lange encapsulated our Nation’s desire for independence, (Medicinal cannabis wouldn’t be a bad stance either).
The next Labour Leaders position on the GCSB issue alone could be the tipping point in the next election.
Once the candidates are announced – TDB will give an endorsement.
A copy of this post should be hammered to every MPs and LECs door with a six inch nail, and emailed of course too! Fives Eyes and the TPPA must be cut adrift and an independent course charted if this country is going to survive, let alone succeed.
100 percent correct
Hoorah Martyn, at last someone making some sense.
I agree with every thing Martyn has said re first 100 days.
Labour has an incredible opportunity right now to create a massive point of difference and get back to the basics of what Labour stands for. New Zealanders are screaming out for leadership they have had enough of the dictatorship where they have had no voice.
Can Labour pull it off? you know they can, the new Kirk is under their nose.
Confirm with the Greens their portfolios e.g. offer Russell Norman the finance role, Mana and Labour need to cut the throat out of the Maori party by making a deal. get the game plan sorted with the coalition partners NOW the battle starts on the Maori electorates once the coalition is unified and working together then its Haere rā Mr key
I do not agree with giving Russel the finance portfolio. That will be a very wrong destabilising move as he and the Greens do not at all fit that slot.
I dont agree
Dr Norman for finance .
We need to adopt more green policies.
We cant keep our heads in the sand any longer.
Yes to all of this post and send to every Labour MP – this is time up at the Last Chance Saloon.
The MSM is of course the Left’s worst enemy for the reasons given along with their idea of reflected glory by aligning with the wealthy. Another thorn in the side of Labour you mentioned is radio interviews such as heard on Radio Live this morning with Marcus Lush interviewing a bunch of MSM talking heads with Matthew Hooten – Yes Hooten – saying Robertson is Labour’s saviour as the next leader ! Excuse me, no one in their right mind takes advice from Hooten – NATZ should be tattooed on his forehead. Any given spells a death knell for Labour if taken up. Called psychology 101. Just hope the caucus has learnt its lesson with divide and conquer a lost cause and have now come to their senses by choosing the best person to take on Key and get this train wreck of a country back on track. And we know who that is don’t we? Smiling all the way to the voting booth 🙂
I’m with the above – one of the best posts yet on this subject. Labour need to make a choice now – if the right-leaning and careerist members of caucus choose Robertson over Cunliffe to feather their nests, they will instead be digging the party’s grave.
I dunno how many others have noticed that the bulk of tory input favours anyone but Cunliffe. That should be a signal to all that it is indeed Cunliffe’s time.
I realise I am quoting the dire John Armstrong there, but Armstrong’s support is the exception, likely motivated by either a need to be perceived as objective by speaking out anti-tory on a subject where he has fuck all traction to influence, or a need to sound different to the Dominion whose political ‘experts’ are 100% anyone but Cunliffe.
I had a history tutor at ANU whose doctoral dissertation was on the destruction the Fairfax media wreaked upon the Australian Labor Party. Everything from the creation of the right wing DLP (democratic labour party -an alleged workers political movement which conservative catholic bishops ordered their working class & migrant parishioners to vote for in the 1950’s & 60’s) to the Whitlam dismissal and the Fraser dictatorship that followed, were enthusiastically cheer-leaded by the Melbourne Age, the Sydney Morning Herald and much later, channel 7.
The feud between Fairfax & the Australian Labor Party continues to this day, a classic example being the hands-off attitude the Gillard government adopted towards the co-ordinated campaign of destruction the Packer & Murdoch youngsters waged against Fairfaxes in 2011 & 2012.
Any media outlet than Fairfax & the Oz goverment would have protected the Australian media ownership diversity which is meant to ensure a wide range of journalistic opinion.
Anyway back to this side of the Tasman where the Dominion has been shrill in claiming that Robertson is the frontrunner.
Not because they want to see Robertson as PM, the opposite, the have judged Robertson to be a much easier target for a classic Fairfax inspired tory takedown.
When Cunliffe is selected the dom will prattle on about ‘fit ups’ and factions but that won’t get much attention from citizens if Cunliffe is fast outta the blocks with lefts & rights into the belly of the KeyCorp beast.
Cunliffe is sharper & presents a lot less ‘convenient label holders’ to which the Dominion could slap their definition of him in.
Yeah all other things being equal the Labour Party should stand on principle and refuse to let the tories define the type of kiwi who can & cannot be labour leader, but all other things aren’t equal, policy differences aside, David Cunliffe has many more of the attributes liked by those who claim ‘I don’t follow politics’ yet still vote than Grant Robertson.
Robertson is getting better but he still gets snookered by more experienced communicators.
There are only 14 months until the next election, whoever Labour picks certainly does have to hit the ground sprinting, and not need either a ‘honeymoon period’ or training wheels if Labour is gonna be an effective counter to a KeyCorp rerun.
Make no mistake about it, if this mob of traitors, sleazebags and outright thieves get in again, Aotearoa will be reduced to a state that cannot be repaired via the ballot box, no matter how strong & honest the rectifiers are.
The people of NZ will simply no longer possess either the power or the economic resources to get out of the third world banana republic hole KeyCorp shoehorned them in to.
If at all possible, for a big mob of reasons, not least of which is that humans need to be royally stomped, slaughtered & oppressed before they do pick up the thirty-aught-six ballot paper, I would prefer to see our country righted via the ballot box than outta the barrel of a gun.
Agreed, but why the Americanism with the calibre? We use three oh three down here.
My suggestion is Cunliffe and Louisa Walls and give ’em hell.
Sorry Boomer but I think your “pissing in the wind”. Labour will follow ever other Labour party in the west, and not do anything you have suggested.
Labour are not capable to give up of factionalism, Labour are not able to see beyond self interest, Labour are a failed party who many wish weren’t.
Watch nothing really happen, watch a little change and a lot of bluster, watch the self interest of a few, win out over the many.
I’d like to believe in Labour – but 30 years of lies and a fubar relationship with working people is to much. This horse an’t changing rider in mid race – it forgot how.
Is that you John?
Hmmm sadly I agree with Adam…if one believes in miracles though, then perhaps their is a modicum of hope!
I gave up on the NZLP long ago. If Cunliffe can lead them out of the neocon wilderness it will be a major miracle, but I wish him well in that challenge.
>> Medicinal cannabis wouldn’t be a bad stance either <<
It wouldn't be bad, but implementing everything recommend by Law Commission's in their very cautious review of the Misuse of Drugs Act would be better. Labour can pass the buck to the Law Commission when the right wing pundits hoe in and they will only succeed in alienating the significant proportion of the economically right-leaning who want to see not just decriminalisation of medicinal cannabis and social dealing, but full legalisation a la Washington and Colorado.
Great stuff Bomber. What you left out is climate change. This is the elephant in the front room. It is the massing German army on the Polish Border. It is the one issue that David Shearer refused to confront, or even mention. It is the one issue that Key and the Nats are most weakest on. They should be hammered and hammered hard on this issue.
Most polls taken in the US nowadays show that the majority of the American people are convinced of the reality of climate change, even republican voters. And even if they are not convinced would support taking action to prevent it.
http://www.pollingreport.com/enviro.htm
Similar polling if done in NZ would probably show the same result. This is a vast untapped constituency.
Last week 1003 permanent jobs in the renewable sector were “blown away” because the cost of electricity from coal fired Huntly is so cheap.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/9066601/Waikato-windfarm-backtrack-costs-hundreds-of-jobs
The true cost of coal is not just the cost of getting it out of the ground and into the Huntly boilers. This is not the real cost of coal. The real cost of coal is measured in sickness illness and death. Some of that cost is made up the effects of climate change, some from sulphur dioxide pollution, acid rain, respiratory diseases, asthma. Some of that cost is measured in deadly underground mine disasters. James Hansen has said “If we can’t stop coal it is all over for the climate.”
If the true cost of coal was factored in to what the electricity companies had to pay for it, not just one wind farm would spring up but ten. Creating not 1013 permanent jobs, but 10,130 permanent jobs.
Kia ora Bomber. I loved your vision for the role of social media.
But maybe your website here has a role to play in our democracy right now.
Your website could be great.
It could be the way of the future.
It could be major part in the way democracy functions from now on.
Climate Change is the greatest challenge that Humanity has ever faced. This country must be, and should be in the front line in the fight against it.
Each and every single contender for the Labour leadership should be challenged on where they stand on it.
http://www.labour.org.nz/news/speech-the-dolphin-and-the-dole-queue
Cunliffe has shown his hand what about the rest?
In the struggle for the Labour Party leadership will this issue even be raised?
Could it be raised on your site?
Have you thought of polling the candidates?
You have the ability and necessary profile and respect. I am sure that each of the candidates would talk to you.
What about all the other major issues?
GCSB bill?
Housing?
Working with other parties?
Bomber. Could blogsites like yours become something more, become an integral part of our democracy, able to influence events.
I would add to this.
America gone by lunch time.
Maybe voting should be compulsory?
Someone needs to warn Australia, because if Abbot gets in they will get their own dose of Key world vision. I don’t suggest this altruistically, but if National are reinstalled it would be good to have a plan B.
“Divide and Rule, the politician cries; unite and lead, is the watchword of the wise”
Well if Labour actually implement these suggestions AND do something about animal welfare instead of kowtowing to the factory farming industry the way Sutton and Anderton did, then I will consider not only voting for them, but joining them and putting my name forward as the Tauranga candidate.
Revolution, i doubt it.
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