1. Too bad we’ve got to endure a crisis to get rid of the economic fascists every damn time in this country.

   Mind you , better that than the last 35 years of neo liberal reforms. So I guess taking a hit to extricate ourselves from these parasitic orks must be done sooner or later.

2. The amount of mental gymnastics you have to do to make yourself feel good about bad news is hilarious. It could be a case study.

   • So Mr Captain Obvious, you haven’t actually addressed any of the points Frank raised. The only thing obvious here is you’re too busy making snide remarks rather than discussing the issues raised.

     It’s so obvious that you can’t debate the points, just sneer at the messenger.

   • Exactly Captain, I figure factor in the budget and Nats poll even higher.
     Left wing still attacking Key personally. Will they ever learn.

   • I agree, the poll seems to favour National – but what is obvious Captain is that NZ’s debt has increased from 10 to 35 billion under National – having been reduced under Labour. We have a rock star economy based on an earthquake, a housing bubble and a vulnerable single low value dairy commodity – that is what is obvious to me but obviously not to pollsters. Incidentally I don’t support either of these parties.

     • If you forget the Canterbury earthquakes and the Global Recession. Your argument may have some basis in fact.

3. If this poll is true, then it doesn’t say much about the values and morals of NZers!

   • I would trust the values and morals of NZs more than the honesty of the polls.Frank has got it right,whenever there is something to hide by this government the polls lie to make it appear the country believes them .

   • what, just because they aren’t your values? crickey, you’re talking over half the population here.

4. So let me get this straight – you wanted National to run budget surpluses through a recessionary low-growth period?

   “Be careful what you wish for” is what i would suggest.

   • No poll got it right during the run up to the election remember?
     Especially this company From Australia???

     Yes I speak with some authority here as this is a very fishy pollster company.

     They called our home in august 2014 and asked us to participate in the election poll they were conducting then and said there was another “Party” listening in on the conversation which left me somewhat surprised, so I cautiously agreed.

     After 5 minutes of strange questions they had asked us which really were “diversions” from the subject of voting they announced that we were intelligible and hung up????

     I felt that all of a sudden she was given the message not to use us as a appropriate source possibly because of our political persuasion.

     I posted this on TS and TDB and others also came forward saying they had received similar responses as we did. so the Morgan pollsters look corrupted alright, and not surprising as the Australian Banks are making a killing over the Auckland housing bubble Key is pushing right??

     Perhaps they own this shifty Morgan pollster company through the “silent partnership” policy they use.

     We really are taken to the cleaners here in NZ.

     • I think you’ll find Roy Morgan always exaggerates Labours numbers.
       I thought the left loved RM polls as it gives them false hope.

5. Delusional – “the polls and voters are wrong and need to change, we’re just perfect as we are, why can’t the fools see that?”

   You lot are making it too easy for National; no matter how badly they perform, no matter how many stuff ups they make, they’re STILL a much better option in the eyes of voters! You’re all holding your breath and waiting for the public to see JK and National the way you see them, and then fall in love with you again. It’s not going to happen unless you change, not us – most of us don’t like what you’re selling! Do the country a favour, get your act together and make it tough for them for crying out loud.

   • I couldn’t agree more and I’m no National voter. The fact that this government can perform so poorly and still enjoy these levels of popularity is a serious indictment on the opposition – much in the way one million plus non-voters is. Both of these phenomena are largely, if not exclusively, the product of low-grade feckless political representation across the spectrum. Self-serving party politics, corruption, dishonesty, selfishness and greed have finally brought us to the lowest possible common denominator and the worst leadership this country has ever seen bar none, with no cure in sight. Enjoy it while we can however … these days will become “the good old days” very quickly from here.

6. Frank, if you were talking about a new Government 1 year into it’s first term I wouldn’t write off the possibility of your analysis being accurate.

   But you are talking about a Government that is reaching massive levels of support 1 year into it’s third term. No, really.

   I’m with all the others that are starting to wonder WTF it will take to drag the old school Left kicking and screaming into reality?

   Maybe when the polls start pushing 60%?

7. What the Left should be able to offer is a joined-up approach. Not manipulative knee jerks and smoke-and-mirror policy such as New Zealand has enjoyed for the last few years. There is a consistency in our goals and methods. That is why the uncharacteristic lack of discipline in Andrew’s off the cuff comment and the lack of sureness of foot in reacting to the budget were particularly unfortunate.

   What is needed from an inclusive party leader is to be seen talking to Helen Clark, Rod Oram, Chris Trotter, Brian Edwards, Michael Cullen, John Campbell, Russel Norman, Winston Peters, Peter Sharples (and his own lieutenants). The only pronouncement need be that New Zealand needs a new direction and that some useful contributors have been unnecessarily sidelined.

   Offer to work with the National Party on making the legal system more responsive; on getting beneficiaries back into the mainstream through a revamped Social Welfare System modeled perhaps on Whanau Ora; on a nationwide agreement on Superannuation, maybe reviving the Cullen Fund; on any number of things that that New Zealanders need certainty on. He can state that the country must contribute to a better Public Broadcasting system through the tax system, not just advertising, perhaps by joining up the TVNZ news system with National Radio and the internet to provide a genuine forum for debate and discussion.

   As you all know these approaches will, no doubt be refused with disdain and a typical John Key sneer. But who will then be speaking for all New Zealander? And who will be the sour-faced nay-sayer?

   If Labour offers to work constructively let that appear to start now. If they want to be leader of the Left that must start by consultation now. But no more policy on the hoof, please.

   (A worker who has toiled his whole life on the minimum wage, then retires but continues to earn in addition to his Super. This is his only chance of having a comparatively comfortable last years. Do you really want to penalize him? Of course not).

   So no hard policy until you have joined the dots. Please.

   • “back into the mainstream”

     Perhaps you could define the current ‘mainstream’?

     My own view is it looks like the Rakaia in midsummer – lots of braids.
     Corporates. Self-employed. Public service. Private ‘service providers’. SMEs. Seasonal and temporary.

     Full-time traditional. Part time. Zero hours ‘contracts’ (Shackles provided free.) Workers splintered and isolated. Solidarity and unity? Pfft! That’s sooo last century. It’s for pissants and plebs. They told us so.

     Now which is the dominant mainstream? And how many people are thus employed? And how much capacity is there for new hiring at a living wage? Unless they’re like Solid Energy – cutting jobs to cut costs and look like ‘profitable’?

     Or are we really in a transition phase to a new work landscape and the government is living in the past with respect to its ‘welfare’ provisions? Along with Labour – who lost the big picture a long time ago – back in the days of Palmer and Moore.

     A few of these ideas and moves might apply here, though. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/26/queens-speech-miliband

8. I wish I could share your humble optimism, Frank.

   But I do not.

   The main problem is, Labour does not present clear policy. They have put new policy drafting and shaping on hold, given the review of existing policy, and their fear to present some policy too soon.

   The logic they follow is, that if they present some policy too early before an election, and if it proves popular, National will steal it and adopt it in modified form, this making Labour’s policy somewhat redundant.

   But with Budget readings, the dilemma Labour and the whole opposition face is, that they are easily left without any real, detectable alternative to what National and its allies present.

   For the observer this means, Labour stands there like a wannabe emperor with no clothes. So how can the opposition dare criticise new measures announce through the Budget, when it does not offer an alternative the voters can grasp?

   This leads to the opposition, especially Labour as main opposition party, to be seen as offering NO alternative, and creates a catch22 position in regards to polling.

   It leaves Labour in the doldrums, and when it may present some ideas and policies shortly before the election, the government of the day will simply say, that is all just wishful stuff and will never be honoured, because it has just been thought out for winning votes.

   That will raise questions again in voters, and so they may stick with the government they know.

   It is better in my view, to present and STICK to firm policies, and not shift from them, and even if some may temporarily seem “unpopular”, like a CGT, this can always change again (see the Nats adopting a kind of CGT for houses resold in 2 years now).

   Labour look like a party that lost its way, mainly, because it does not commit firmly to policy, and changing leaders so often has not helped. That is the worst any party can do, and they are still stuck in that trap they have been in over the last 7 years.

   So they must sit down, think out and develop smarter, more traditional Labour heart and soul policies, present them convincingly and smartly (after working out the figures to finance them, and what impacts they may have), and STICK to them.

   As topics, issues, debates arise, they must stick to them, and tell journalists this with no doubts being allowed.

   • Labour does not look like a party that has lost it’s way – it has proven it beyond doubt, they are still in the 1930’s and are lead by a confused unionist.

9. Couldn’t agree less, Mike.

   It isn’t policy that differentiates the Left, it is the approach we take. Policies come and go as a response to events and circumstances, but the belief that everyone in a society deserve to be able to fully participate in that society persists. We also believe that it is only by judicious intervention by the collective population, perhaps in the form of government, perhaps through groupings like unions, that this participation will be created or defended from corrosive actions on the part of those who believe only in the law of the jungle.

   All people who believe that governmental or societal actions can make lives better are only one psychological step away from supporting an interventionist approach to government. An approach which is only available on the Left. The question becomes what constitutes a good outcome and what is the best intervention to effect that result.

   If you seek no solution because you don’t see any advantage coming from change, then your natural home is with John Key. Most people are unaware of their own interests, mainly because they have the attention span of a gnat. (Not a mosquito, which seems to have an admirable attention span). The purpose, then is to hammer away at the core reason for the existence of the Left. Not any transitory policy; not at this point anyway.

   When people understand that bad things will not change unless action is taken, they will be more interested in seeking the best way of effecting solutions.

   (If National borrows policy, that’s a good thing. Unfortunately they will inevitably stuff it up because they understand nothing of an interventionist world view. That’s why they think $25.00 next year constitutes some kind of solution. An electoral solution, perhaps, as it salves the conscience of the easily reassured, but it will barely make a dent for recipients. Of course for the current administration, the latter goal is the less important of the two targets).

   • “governmental or societal actions can make lives better are only one psychological step away from supporting an interventionist approach to government”

     Sounds like National to me. They can prate and prattle about ‘small government’ and ‘self-determination’ but don’t they rush into legislation to look after themselves when it suits them!

     The price fixers. Well-slanted playing fields. Employer protection. All sounds like interventionist government in support of sustaining the status quo in favour of a few.

     And the Left? Well they’re the same. Holier than thee, me, and any one else who isn’t of the Inner Circle. Still believing that the ‘educated middle class’ can be the guides, the shepherds. ‘Let us do it for you because, you know, we know best.’

     Anarchy is starting to look quite appealing…

   • There will always be times where some change is necessary and will be wise to make. But what you recommend is an environment of constant change, a flowing society, where there is no true certainty and stability.

     Believing that the input of individuals, preferably in collective groups, which can only be diverse, given New Zealands population base and varied interests, will be easy to reconcile and manage 24/7, to have functioning government, is over idealistic.

     The vast majority of people prefer a sound degree of certainty, stability and reliability in government, and if there is a perception of much disunity, endless debate, too much division and thus lack of cohesion, most will not feel that comfortable.

     It is part of human nature wanting to feel secure, safe, and to belong, and the more of a “flowing”, debating and moving society we have, the less people will feel like that.

     I dare to say, again, it was in a large part the fear of most voters, to have a government made up of 3 or more parties, with different programs and ideas, that helped National to hang onto power, and even thrash Labour, as most voters could not see how a government like that would function well and offer what they felt they needed.

     Of course the biased media and so played a role also.

     What I commented above would still allow for democratic processes, debate and change, within reason, but there needs to be a set of important core policies, that are not questioned with each election defeat, with each Budget, with each media report, with each challenge or temporary change of mood there is.

10. For the left, and even given Frank’s well crafted analysis, the poll (and others like it) are sobering, with National polling more than all other parties put together, and with all parties to the left of National losing share. I would suggest the following are some of the reasons:

    1. The Govt has borrowed significantly to shield NZ from the worst of the recession. That strategy would appear to have the support of the majority of NZ’ers.
    2. The Govt has invested billions in rebuilding Christchurch, which has had the impact of holding unemployment down, and of spiking demand in a range of industries, both of which spike the tax take.
    3. According to the latest Statistics NZ survey, some 80% of NZ’ers are happy with their lives. That figure has been steadily increasing since 2008 (yes 2008!). With a result like that, the Govt of the day is a shoe in, even if they had nothing to do with creating the sense of well-being.
    4. The current parliamentary opposition are hopelessly uncoordinated. At the time of the last election. it appeared to the voters that the main party of opposition needed between 2 and 4 coalition partners to form a Govt. NZ’er are simply unwilling to accept such a proposition, even more so with the lead party polling under 30%.

    In my opinion there will be no change of Govt until and unless Labour can lift it’s share of the vote to the mid 30’s, and be in a position to be a dominant player in coalition/Govt, much as Helen Clark’s Govt. was.

11. Labour are their own worst enemy. They aren’t united and the party is full of neo liberals, still. They DO NOT support the NZ worker . Labour had many excellent far sighted policies last election which were barely reported by the media. Grant Robertson, Jacinda Ardhern , Annette King and Andrew Little all shafted Cunliffe, They simply cannot be trusted. Labour is full of anti Green sentiment . I have been dismayed to meet some of the most ignorant people on the planet who are Green party haters and key members of Labour.Also key Labour members who do not give a shit about how their polices have ruined the lives of 2 generations of young New Zealanders. The NZ Labour party is a parody of itself these days. It has always had many bright , caring thinking people but there is far too much dead wood. It is no wonder NEw LAbour was formed, all those years ago and no we have no hope LAbour.

12. If the economy shrank by 5% in one year, inflation rose to 30% per annum and average home loan rates rose to 16%, National would still rise in the polls. The Sleepy Hobbit nation formerly known as New Zealand simply cannot envisage a world without National being on top. That is how apathetic and masochistic this nation has become. This is indeed a sick society

13. This poll can only be interpreted as a reflection on Labour if it is Labour alone that is down in the polls. But all parties, including the Greens and NZ First are also down and I cant see what they have done to deserve this.
    It looks as though the voters have once again swallowed the right-wing media’s interpretation that this is a ‘good’ budget.That’s the problem with democracy – it gives everyone the vote.

14. Hear, hear Mike – give people something to believe in and a good alternative to vote for. With the Nats you wouldn’t think this would be to hard!

15. And this is why John Key wants to change the NZ flag. He is no statesman, so won’t be remembered in that light. His government is bound to come tumbling down at the next election, after which he will be a forgotten entity – but wait, if I can change the flag, I will go down in history – the sooner he goes down the plug hole, the better!

16. […] blogpost was first published on The Daily Blog on 26 May […]

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