When the country is in full lockdown, Prime Minister Ardern appears to be in control. Certain but empathetic, authoritative but kind, delivering bad news with “the team of five million” behind her. I say that is how she “appears” because it is obviously complete crap; however, nothing makes Jacinda Ardern and the Labour government appear competent like completely shutting down the country.
New Zealand went into its second round of Alert Level 4 ten weeks ago and has stayed under some form of lockdown restrictions ever since: a period much longer than the first Level 4 lockdown. This time the lockdown is far more economically destructive but it also contains other complicated elements which make the Prime Minister’s illusion of competence difficult to maintain. In 2021, there are vaccines, domestic and international hindsight, regionalised and different lockdown approaches and an increasingly resentful electorate that is no longer too frightened to leave the house.
Even notorious political leaders such as Victoria’s Dictator Dan have clear pathways out of lockdown and are traversing them despite high daily case numbers. Ten weeks is a long time in politics and this time Covid can’t be the only show on the news; it is showing up this Labour government to be just as incompetent as the pre-Level 4 2.0 Government we remember.
The laughable $785 million cycle bridge has been dropped at a cost of $31 million. The on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again, on-again tramway from Dominion Road to the airport has exploded in cost from $1.4 billion to $14 billion. Three Waters, essentially a battle over who owns and controls water – which John Key wisely avoided – is chipping away at Labour’s support. Few people actually understand the dispute but the narrative of big central government taking assets from little local governments is sticking and it hurts.
This week’s Roy Morgan poll suggests support for the Labour government is sliding. I’m hesitant to uncork any bottles of bubbles yet. My research suggests that incumbent lockdown governments are re-elected governments but, as new information becomes available, predicting future events based on past behaviour becomes less reliable. I believe we are ten days away from another Curia poll which may accompany a leaked Talbot Mills poll: less reliable than Colmar Brunton or Reid Research but more so than a single Roy Morgan poll.
Boots on the ground activism may be creating the impression that Ardern’s usual safe routine of Wellington parliamentary press conferences no longer passes the sniff test with the general public. On Tuesday it was a lone mother with a baby, though her identity categories made her presence more damaging than a thousand protestors led by Brian Tamaki. The reporter who forced Ardern’s press conference inside to resume with “accredited” media, was damaging, lending credence to the argument that the media were bought off by $55 million of ‘Covid payments.’
Having this event followed up by Wednesday’s protest outside a Whangarei vaccination centre which cancelled Ardern’s planned event outside, is starting to create the perception that the wheels are falling off the Labour spin-doctor’s bus. The Prime Minister cannot shrug off being trapped inside a small district council building by a group of hundreds as trying to avoid putting off those who may visit the vaccination centre. Chris Hipkins’s comments later in the afternoon were equally incredible. He claimed the group “bussed themselves in from elsewhere, they weren’t locals, and there is a very active – small but active – group of people who are travelling around the country.” Perhaps he would also like to explain how this group is managing to bypass police checkpoints at both ends of Auckland to achieve this.
On Thursday, Hipkins’s suggestion that some double vaccinated Aucklanders may be allocated times that they can leave and return to Auckland over the Christmas holiday is having cold water applied by Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson; the familiar routine of silly announcement followed up by a Robertson disclaimer has returned. The Labour government looks like random idiots being contained by the Deputy Prime Minister and those who oppose this government begin to hope it is on its last legs.
A National-Act victory in the 2023 election is a possibility but unlikely. You and I don’t occupy the echo-chambers the rest of the country live in, and Labour’s support is strong and impassioned. If Labour can survive a coalition with New Zealand First which forced it into several humiliating U-turns, it can build upon being incumbent during a lockdown. There is much work ahead for the centre-right yet.