Phil Green
I was listening to Jamie Mackay’s rural programme on NewstalkZB yesterday, when he interviewed Winston Peters.
In our house of shifting political allegiances, the segment with Winston is now compelling listening given the parlous state of our small nation.
Jamie quizzed Winston about people’s fears that he may still turn back to Labour in 2023 if the gods of fortune and voters grant him another go. Winston stuck to his guns, and as he explained to Sean Plunket on the Platform, he wouldn’t consider a coalition with people who’d lied to him.
Jamie wasn’t convinced and, as happened subsequent to the Plunket interview, Winston’s words were dissected to explore the semantics of his statement. The upshot is that people won’t believe Winston unless he states categorically that he’ll never enter into a coalition with Labour under any circumstances.
This is an inherently anti-democratic statement to make, given that Labour voters still comprise a healthy proportion of the electorate. Despite the present circumstances being exceptional, with many conservative commentators abhorring the abject slide into tribal rule, and many left-leaning writers too, if we are to uphold the premise of fair and full representation, then we can’t bind our elected representatives to disenfranchise a sizeable group of voters.
On the other hand, we actively vote to secure our chosen party’s election, at the defeat of others we wish to prevail over. Nothing undemocratic about that, and Winston Peters is unique among our present parties that realistically ‘have a shot at power’, where he can determine the outcome and has done so a few times in the past.
I devour the comments on The BFD when anything about Winston is published, gleaning the state of the nation, so to speak. The prevailing view is that Winston can’t be trusted. Well, I trust him, and I’ve never voted NZ First, and I’m still undecided now, but only for strategic reasons.
My point, and I’ve written many comments about this as the occasion arises, is that we are assailed by three significant power blocks, Labour, National and ACT, all of whom nobody trusts to deliver the goods to satisfy everyone. Labour bad (they are), National (Labour lite), and ACT doing absolutely everything right except for the most vital human rights elements (vaccine mandates and vaccination per se).
The fire is not being held to the feet of these parties to the same degree as to Winston Peters and NZ First. This isn’t a bad thing, as by warming his feet we get to hear the measure of the man, and there is presently no other who is saying out loud on the mainstream media what needs to be said.
Lastly, and these words will sting, it wasn’t Winston Peters who betrayed his voters in 2017, it was his voters in 2020 who betrayed him and the country by abandoning him.