The media has fallen out of love with Jacinda. It’s about time. John Armstrong has some harsh words about our princess and her government, and it is music to my ears.
The glitter of Jacinda Ardern’s crown no longer sparkles or glistens quite so gloriously as it did not that many months ago. The Prime Minister’s political wizardry likewise no longer casts quite the spell over her opponents it once did.
She no longer walks on water. Her struggle from now on will be to keep her head above the water. She’s been swamped by the backwash from her mishandling of matters mundane. Her legacy is at risk of being a long list of monuments to failure.
Her political epitaph might turn out to be all about what she did not achieve rather than what she did achieve.
Being prime minister is a tough job, which cannot be done with slogans and hugs.
It is all a far cry from the assumption that she only needs to turn up at next year’s general election in order to win it. It is a far cry from the talk of her picking up the Nobel Peace, something which would place her in the esteemed company of the likes of Nelson Mandela, Yasser Arafat, Mother Theresa and Barack Obama.
Barack Obama got the Nobel Prize for being the first black president. The respect and standing of the award have gone downhill ever since.
The last three or four months have witnessed a significant shift in stance on the part of those Ardern-watchers. Not only has the criticism of the government become more severe, Ardern’s performance has received some pretty torrid reviews.
They were prompted by her failure to put the squeeze on New Zealand First and force Labour’s coalition partner to give ground and give its backing to a capital gains tax even in its most limited form.
The “failure of delivery” theme gained further traction in subsequent months, especially in the wake of the fiasco that was KiwiBuild.
Bold promises and action plans are one thing, but at some point, the voters expect some action. We are still waiting.
New Zealand’s political history is littered with the corpses of Labour governments which over-estimated the public’s appetite for change and under-estimated the potency of the streak of conservatism which runs deep in New Zealand’s conformist society.
Ardern’s Administration has been notable for being a roller coaster-like ride, one which has seen the throttle set at maximum speed in a mad-cap rush to reform just about anything that comes within its radar — and a whole lot more which does not.
They always say that Labour governments are the ones that get things done. This Labour government is breaking the mould in spectacular fashion.
With the next general election little more than a year away, the Prime Minister has to find the right formula which slows the forces driving her Government at break-neck speed, but which does not result in it stalling and further exacerbating the problem of delivery.
In that regard, next Wednesday’s unveiling of the KiwiBuild “reset” is crucial not just in terms of what the Government thinks it can achieve in such a critical portfolio over the next 12 months.
The reset will be a measure of the willingness of Ardern and her senior ministers to curb its wider ambition across the whole of government so that it is in sync with the capacity of the bureaucracy to meet realistic targets.
We will have to wait and see, but there is no realistic chance of saving Kiwibuild. The regulation process is too long, and there are just not enough builders to make a difference; the construction industry is at full throttle already. Then there is the fact that quite a few Kiwibuild houses remain unsold. There is little point in building houses that nobody wants.
The window that opened following the 2017 election and which enabled Labour and its two support partners to blame National for everything that was going wrong in the Universe has closed.
‘Nine years of neglect’, anyone?
It is National which is asking the awkward questions. It is Labour which is now failing to supply adequate answers. In that vein, Ardern is vulnerable to the charge that a fair chunk of what she utters is political flannel. She is exceptionally good at making the meaningless sound meaningful.
TVNZ
I disagree. I think she is exceptionally good at making the meaningless sound meaningless. A true master in fact.
A leader who talks rubbish most of the time. Ministers who destroy profitable industries, and fail to grant permits to sustainable energy projects. Green ministers who call people who just want to get to work on time ‘car fascists’. A government that has plenty of money, but no idea what to do with it. We are being governed by clowns. Just how exactly did this happen?
Oh. That’s right. Winston made it happen.