Useless

John Key is leaving Parliament the moment he is able to without causing a by-election. But don't worry - because Labour is letting him do it without affecting the government's majority:

Former Prime Minister John Key will quit Parliament on April 14 after delivering his farewell speech next week.

The timing will allow Parliament to avoid a by-election in his Helensville seat, which can be left vacant if he leaves within six months of the September 23 general election.

Meanwhile Labour's David Cunliffe has also announced he is leaving early, with a final day of April 23 [during a recess - I/S] - ensuring the relative strengths of the Government and Opposition are preserved.

I have one question: why? Why would an opposition possibly want to do this? Especially when there's important legislation like the gutting of the RMA on the table? Why would an opposition want to let the government keep its ability to legislate at will, rather than gaining the ability to advance the aims of its members via an effective veto on government legislation?

I understand that Labour can't stop Cunliffe from resigning if he wants to. But this move, echoing the old FPP practice of pairing, seems to be sacrificing a real opportunity for diddly-squat. Its a reminder that when push comes to shove, Labour is just a bit useless really - and that's not a good message to be sending in an election year.

A clear difference on child poverty

Last night's 3 News leader's debate finally gave us a clear difference between the leaders. On the subject of child poverty, David Cunliffe was absolutely clear:

I have to say that I was pretty shocked to see those schools that have the empty desks on your show where children like mine and yours went to school with no lunches. And I was just as shocked to see the empty fridges. And at the end of the day that's what this is about. We've got a hundred thousand children in New Zealand that are growing up in working families, working families, who just don't earn enough to feed them. And then we've got another 160,000 children growing up on benefits, or sole-parent households, who haven't got a chance. And so we just simply must help this. And I want to say this: if I'm elected Prime Minister, this will be my personal number one priority. This is why I am in politics. I will not stand by and see kids hungry when they go to school. It is not good enough. We are better than that!

I'm going to come back on this program, each and every year as Prime Minister, and I am going to give you hard data on exactly how many children our programmes, like Best Start, $60 a week per child, have lifted out above the poverty line. It will be my top priority. I say that solemnly.

Its even more powerful when you watch it [from 3:05]. Yes, Labour helped create this problem. But I don't think we can doubt that Cunliffe recognises it as a moral challenge which we have to solve. Compare that to Key. He dodges. He minimises. He blames the victims. The short version of his response is that "of course" we have to do something, but its not really as bad as you think, and it only affects poor people anyway, so we don't actually need to do any more than we are at present. Its just not a priority for him, and certainly less of one than seeing his rich mates get a tax cut in three year's time.

And that's our choice right there: between a man who recognises child poverty as a moral challenge we must rise to, and one who views it as a PR problem to be minimised and dodged.

Remember that when you vote. If you vote for Key, you're voting for a monster who doesn't care that children are starving.

A commitment we can hold him to

Still reading Dirty Politics. Meanwhile, in addition to all the damage to the government from the truth coming out, we've also got something else useful from it: a firm commitment to higher standards from David Cunliffe:

Labour Party leader David Cunliffe says if he was Prime Minister he would hold his ministers to a higher standard than John Key does.

[...]

David Cunliffe told Radio New Zealand's Morning Report programme Ms Collins' behaviour was unbecoming of a minister, especially a Justice Minister who is meant to uphold and guide the formation of the law.

He said if Ms Collins was a minister in a government run by him, she would be gone.

"There would be a huge difference in the standards that I would hold my ministers accountable to and the way that the Prime Minister is treating the Minister of Justice."

The full audio is here. And if he becomes Prime Minister and shows any reluctance to enforce high standards on Ministers, we can beat him with it.

Toast

Well, that's David Cunliffe sunk:

Labour Party leader David Cunliffe - who said this week he had never met Donghua Liu or advocated on his behalf - wrote a letter to immigration officials on behalf of the controversial businessman who was applying for residency in New Zealand.

The 2003 letter was written in his capacity as the MP for New Lynn after he was "approached my constituent Donghua Lui [sic] who is concerned at the time it is taking to process his Investment Category application".

Mr Cunliffe this week denied any involvement with Liu's residency bid after the Herald revealed the property developer paid $15,000 at a Labour Party fundraiser for a book signed by Helen Clark in 2007.

The actual letter itself - written in 2003, before Liu donated to Labour, and in his role as a constituency MP - is pretty innocent. It asks for nothing more than a timeframe on a decision, and is clearly an attempt to help a constituent. Its the subsequent strong denial of having had any dealings with Liu that's the problem. At the least, it shows a complete failure of political management (with Liu in the news, and the media alleging Labour Party leaks, a competent leader would have checked his files, and front-footed it if they'd found anything). But it is likely to be interpreted as deliberate dishonesty, a poor attempt at a cover up. And that's what kills him.

If our second largest party wasn't consistently led by muppets, they might have a chance of winning an election. Instead, their muppetry looks likely to condemn us to another three years of National. Thanks, Labour!

Dear Labour: I don't work for you

So, following this morning's post about David Cunliffe's finding his spine on Iraq, I received an email from Rob Egan, "Senior Strategic Communications Advisor" in the Office of the Leader of the Opposition, who assured me that Cunliffe didn't focus group his position and that "the release was not delayed pending “testing” but was released as logistics allowed."

Right, so Cunliffe isn't a focus-group led mollusc, just so useless and lacking in political instincts that he can't say what he thinks on an important issue without having to effectively retract his original position within 24 hours. Glad we cleared that up.

Meanwhile, there's this bit:

I realise that the speed of social media means that misunderstandings can arise rapidly, and that part of the value of blogging is that it captures reaction quickly and without mediation, but I would really appreciate it if get in touch with me about any serious concerns you have such as this. You can reach me by phone or email most of the time.

To which I've already tweeted my response: Dear Labour: I don't work for you. I don't work for anyone. I voice my own views. If you don't like them, you can go fuck yourself.

You shouldn't need a focus group to find your spine

On Friday, David Cunliffe was asked about whether he would send combat troops to Iraq. His response? Mush (you can listen to the full quote here). 24 hours later when he's had time to run a focus group and do some polling, his position had changed completely:

The Labour government I lead would not contribute combat troops to Iraq under any foreseeable circumstances.

While Labour's new position is welcome, a leader worthy of the name shouldn't need a focus group to find their spine for them on an issue like this. Helen Clark certainly didn't. And the net effect of Cunliffe's wibbling has been to make him appear untrustworthy to his own potential supporters (who have been sent a clear message that he either can't be trusted on core issues, or can't recognise one to save himself), while making him look weak, contemptible, and incompetent to everyone else.

David ain't no Helen

With Iraq turning into a mess again, and the US refusing to rule anything out while pointedly saying it can always count on Australia, people in New Zealand are asking the obvious question: if the US starts another war, will our politicians join it?

John Key hasn't spoken up yet. As for David Cunliffe, he's just been asked about it by Newstalk ZB's Felix Marwick. His response is pure mush:

Cunliffe on troops to Iraq: wd dep' on the circumstances when request made. Won't hypothesize what answer wd be w/out having specific facts.

a difficult decision and would rely on the position taken by the United Nations and our partners. Can't rule anything in or out.

And there you have it: David Cunliffe ain't no Helen Clark. If you want New Zealand to stay out of America's stupid wars, you'll need to vote for someone else.

Update: And meanwhile, John Key says the chances of his government contributing to any intervention are "remote". Its a sad day when Labour looks more warmongering than National.

An economic upgrade?

David Cunliffe presented the broad strokes of his economic policy today, under the slogan of an "economic upgrade". Much of it was stuff we'd heard before: capital gains tax, universal kiwisaver, R&D tax credits, better monetary policy. But there's also a strong focus on regional development, industrial policy, and direct government intervention. It still needs to be fleshed out, but its not a bad start. Because one thing is clear: we need to move our economy away from a focus on milk. Our environment can't sustain it, and its not delivering for anyone other than a narrow class of wealthy farmers. As research from the New Zealand Institute has shown, rich economies have multiple sources of income. And they consciously develop them through industrial policy. And the Ministry for Economic Development (back before it became MoBIE) agreed; back in 2009 they were recommending that the government support IT and high-tech manufacturing to overcome its capital deficit by taking direct stakes in promising companies. It will be interesting to see whether Labour is willing to go this far, or whether they'll compromise their proposed economic transformation by soft-peddling it to the business community.

A win for transparency

Labour leader David Cunliffe has given up on trying to launder his donations and revealed who his backers were:

He said the three donors willing to be named were Selwyn Pellett, Perry Keenan and Tony Gibbs, who gave a combined total of $9,500. Mr Pellett, a businessman, is a longstanding Labour supporter who has donated to the party and Mr Cunliffe in the past.

Mr Gibbs is a businessman and former right hand man to Sir Ron Brierley. Perry Keenan is a New Zealander who is now senior partner at the Boston Consulting Group in Chicago. Mr Cunliffe worked for the Boston Consulting Group prior to entering Parliament.

He said other donors had given a total of $8,300 but were not willing to be named.

"That is their legal right. I respect their decision and can't control it. In their case, the trust will be returning their donations to them." He said he did not know who those donors were, or whether they were individuals or corporates.

That's good news. But then there's this bit:

"I don't think in hindsight that a trust structure fully represented the values I would like to bring to this leadership. Decisions that were made to set up the trust could have been better. I have learned form that and am now making sure I do whatever I can to ensure transparency."

Which is just sociopathic "sorry I got caught" bullshit. The thing about values is that you live them, and they're instinctive. Cunliffe's aren't. When faced with a choice between transparency and corruption-enabling secrecy, he chose the latter, and then tried to cling to that choice when it was questioned. These are not the actions of an ethical man who believes in open politics - they are the actions of someone trying to get away with something they know is wrong. And actions like this are yet another example of why the New Zealand public thinks all politicians are liars, cheats and scoundrels.

Still, its a useful precedent: the next time some politician (I'm looking at you, Len Brown) tries to hide their political debts behind a trust, we can beat them with the stick Cunliffe has handily provided us with. Which BTW we should now be turning on his deputy-leader Tertiary Education and Maori Affairs spokesperson.

David Cunliffe: Unethical

So, it turns out that David Cunliffe laundered his party leadership donations through a trust to hide them both from the Labour Party and from Parliament's Register of Pecuniary Interests:

Labour leader David Cunliffe used an "agent arrangement" to take donations to his leadership campaign last November and is refusing to say whether he has disclosed individual donors in the MPs' register of financial interests or whether they were disclosed as being from a trust.

The returns for the Register of Pecuniary Interests were due last Friday, and Mr Cunliffe said his return met both the rules of the register, which requires disclosure of donations of more than $500, and those of the Labour Party, which said all donations would be confidential.

He refused to say how he had met both rules, or whether he had declared donations as being from a trust rather than the original donors.

But he confirmed his campaign was run through an "agent arrangement" rather than taking donations directly. He sought a legal opinion before filing his return and defended the use of trusts.

So, as usual, he's claiming that it was All Within The Rules. But that's not enough - his behaviour needs to be ethical as well. And by failing to tell us who he owes political debts to for financing his leadership ambitions, David Cunliffe has clearly failed that test and is unfit to be in Parliament, let alone a party leader.

Prosecuting Cunliffe

David Cunliffe's election-day tweet has been referred to police. Good. Its a clear (though minor) breach of the law, and the Electoral Commission has to uphold the rules. Unfortunately, judging by their past performance, the police won't - they have no interest in electoral crimes, and even less in prosecuting politicians who could one day decide their budget and powers. So naturally, Graham McCready is stepping up and offering to bring a private prosecution.

I have two comments on this. Firstly, that its a sad state of affairs that this is necessary. We ought to be able to have faith that our police will protect the integrity of our electoral system, but we can't. And that suggests that the police are in serious need of reform, and that we should shift prosecution power for electoral offences to a body which can be trusted, such as the Electoral Commission. Secondly, if McCready brings a case, Cunliffe should plead guilty. He's already admitted posting the statement, and its intent to influence voters is clear. The offence carries a fine of up to $20,000, but its hard to see the maximum being enforced for a minor breach which was immediately corrected, reported and admitted. And it is not severe enough to require resignation from Parliament. Political honesty and the integrity of our electoral system would be served by Cunliffe admitting it, paying the fine, and moving on.

David Cunliffe: Bullshitter or muppet?

So, David Cunliffe may have broken the law against election-day advertising by tweeting in support of Poto Williams on the day of the Christchurch by-election. On the face of it, no harm seems to have been done - the tweet was deleted almost immediately - and given past practice from the Electoral Commission I do not think it will result in prosecution. At the same time, Cunliffe's explanation doesn't quite wash:

"I take responsibility for that, the tweet was sent in error and deleted within seconds and it was reported as soon as possible to the returning officer," he said.

It was a draft which he sent unintentionally and deleted immediately before reporting it to his campaign who he said reported it to the returning officer.

He was not aware of the rules at the time it was sent but said no one else pointed out his mistake to him before he deleted it.

So, it was a draft which he sent "unintentionally" - but if it was a draft, then that strongly suggests an intention to send it later, despite clear law that that would be illegal. He claims to have been ignorant of that law, but immediately deleted the tweet and reported it to the campaign - why do that unless you knew it was illegal? Finally, Cunliffe has been an MP for 14 years, and fought 5 election campaigns - and we're supposed to believe he's unaware of one of the most fundamental rules of New Zealand electoral law? I don't think I'm the only one who will be smelling bullshit here.

But even if we do accept his explanation, then Cunliffe has admitted being a total muppet who doesn't learn from his campaigns and cannot be trusted in possession of a social-media account. And that's hardly any better. Either way, he needs to get his shit together.

David Cunliffe: Sexist

It looks like David Cunliffe can't resist the urge to indulge in sexist abuse. In a column for The Ruminator, he begins:

A couple of months ago I was asked to write a post for the Ruminator and, rather optimistically, I agreed.The original brief was to respond to a post by Judith Collins. My post was going to be about snapper, not trout. But considering that issue, along with Judith’s leadership aspirations, has floundered, I’ll try another hook.

So Judith Collins is a trout. Geddit? Geddit?

As Collins points out, we can imagine the outcry from Labour if one of National's male MPs called a Labour woman a trout. Except we don't have to imagine it - remember this mess from 2007 when Nick Smith called Judith Tizard a witch?

Cunliffe is supposed to be leading a party dedicated to equality. He needs to act like it. Starting with an apology for this cheap, nasty sexism.

Good to hear

David Cunliffe went to the CTU conferance today, and made some solid promises about Labour's initial agenda in office:

David Cunliffe has used one of his first major speeches as Labour leader to further outline his party's major focuses for its first 100 days in office if it wins the next election.

In a strident speech to a receptive audience at the Council of Trade Unions conference in Wellington this morning he promised to scrap National's "anti-worker" employment policies "in the first hundred days" and ensure workers a "better share of the benefits" of a strong New Zealand economy.

There would be no more "fire at will" and no more "attacks on vulnerable workers'' or "undermining health and safety" or a youth wage.

"In the Labour government that I lead John Key's attacks on workers will be gone by lunchtime," he said.

This is all pretty easy to do - National's 90-day bill, its restoration of youth rates, and its theft of lunchbreaks are all easily unravelled. A bill introduced after the election and sent to select committee over the holidays would have time to pass within the first hundred days. It would also send a clear message to employers: any anti-worker provisions they get National to enact will be swiftly reversed the moment the left takes office, so they will be of short-term benefit at most. But all that does is restore the status quo ante. What's interesting is what comes after (and on that front Labour looks pretty positive as well).

One thing worth noting though is that the totemic $15 / hour minimum wage which Labour has promised to meet was set five years ago, when the minimum wage was much lower, and has been effectively eroded by inflation. Rather than being a significant increase (as it was when first pushed), its now a slightly-above pathway one. It will be important as a sign of what's to come, and Labour has an excellent record on using above-inflation minimum wage increases to drive wage growth and equality, so I don't doubt their willingness to go further. But we really need to set them a new target to aim for.

Another David

So, David Cunliffe has been elected Labour Party leader on the first round. As expected, he won the vote outright in the wider party, but did not carry the caucus. I expect journalists will have a field day over this "disunity", but as Tim Barnett pointed out when announcing the results, its a preferential vote, and giving your first preference to one candidate doesn't mean you necessarily oppose the other.

As for how he'll work out, well, he'll be better than Shearer, though that's setting the bar awfully low. More importantly, he seems to have a vision for what Labour should do in power, which is more than can be said for his predecessors. The key failure of Labour's last two leaders (and even Clark to some degree) was a reluctance to articulate such a vision and a preference for empty managerialism (to be fair, Goff tried in 2011, but given his past support for NeoLiberalism and general managerial style, it just came across as fake). But that doesn't get the voters out, let alone get them to care. If his campaign rhetoric was honest, Cunliffe at least will present an alternative, and give voters a decent choice.

And that said: looking back, Labour leaders have inevitably disappointed me, even with my low expectations of them. People who looked like a safe pair of hands weren't (and Shearer was even worse). Cunliffe probably will probably disappoint me too. But as always, I'd love to be proved wrong.

Hope for Labour

David Cunliffe is currently leading the polls to be Labour's next leader. And he's promising a bit of a shakeup:

At the Wellington meeting of the leadership campaign on Saturday, attended by about 600 party members, Mr Cunliffe said the union support would be rewarded with "radical" employment law changes.

This would include industry-standard employment agreements, raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour within 100 days of forming a government, giving the "living wage" of $18 an hour to core public servants, "and rolling out [the living wage] as we can afford to after that".

The Employment Relations Amendment Bill, currently before Parliament, would be repealed "by lunchtime", Mr Cunliffe said.

"That's bedrock David Cunliffe social democratic Labour policy. That is going to happen."

He promised party faithful a visible change in tack from the current government. "The Labour Party I lead will be a true red Labour Party, not a pale blue one."

Its good to hear, especially in the context of his previous "you bet" on whether he would raise taxes on the rich. Labour's biggest problem is that in recent years it hasn't offered anything different, instead continuing the same NeoLiberal policies which have immiserated us with a few cosmetic tweaks around the edges. And as a result, their core supporters have simply stopped voting, or switched to the Greens. A Labour party which actually offered change might reverse that trend.

Meanwhile, I expect we'll see another sniffy Herald editorial about the "dangers" of offering us peasants real choices about policy direction any day now.

An act of self-mutilation

So, the Labour Party caucus has met. As predicted, they have endorsed David Shearer's leadership unanimously - an act which hardly strengthens it given that there will be a revote in February. And as expected, they have banished David Cunliffe to the backbenches.

Well, that'll teach those Labour MPs to be competent and inspiring then. Clearly, that is something which is just incompatible with Labour values. In the modern Labour Party, everyone must be as incompetant and uninspiring as the leadership, for fear of showing them up.

To echo Talleyrand, this is worse than a crime, it is a mistake. Its an extraordinary act of self-mutilation, which shows exactly where Shearer's priorities lie. And its not with having the strongest Parliamentary team to stick it to National. And that's the difference between strong and weak leadership. Helen Clark co-opted her potential rivals. Shearer is so weak he cannot risk being compared to them, so he must destroy them.

Cunliffe on marriage equality

I've been contacted by David Cunliffe about yesterday's post on where MP's stand on marriage equality, which incorrectly put him in the "no" camp. Here's his explanation:

You have cited the MarriageEquality.co.nz team, who listed me as ‘anti-equality’ on their website. It appears they made this judgement before actually asking for my opinion.

I have advised them of my position, which is to support Marriage Equality.

My Labour Party colleague Louisa Wall is arranging a Marriage Equality member’s bill which progresses human rights while protecting existing religious freedoms. I look forward to seeing the text of Louisa’s bill, and to supporting it.

Which is good to hear (and the spreadsheet has now been corrected).

At the same time, I'm a little worried about this talk of "protecting existing religious freedoms". Is Labour going to put up a US-style bigot-amendment? Are they going to allow marriage celebrants - who are public officials, performing a public function - to discriminate on a ground prohibited by the Human Rights Act in the performance of their public duties? I'd love to know.

Update 1/6/2012: Louisa Wall has released her bill [PDF], and it has no nasty surprises. I'm glad to have been wrong.

Faith-based restructuring

Last week, John Key announced that he was merging the Ministries of Economic Development, Building and Housing, Labour, and Science and Innovation into a new "super-ministry". So, how much will this cost? Labour's David Cunliffe asked super-minister Steven Joyce that question in Parliament today. The answer?

The specific costings for the items sought by the member are not available at this time.

Yes, that's right: the government embarked on a major, costly restructuring process, with no idea of how much it will cost. And yet they claim it will produce net savings. Obviously, its hard to take that claim seriously.

This is simply faith-based policy. The business-geniuses of National wouldn't be allowed to run a business this shoddily - their shareholders wouldn't let them. So why do we let them run our government in this way?

Buying back our stuff

National's big (hell, pretty much its only) policy platform this election was to sell our state-owned assets, stuff kiwis have worked a lifetime to build and which benefits all of us, to their rich mates for a song. On Saturday, Labour's David Cunliffe put a stake in the ground on opposing that policy, by saying that they would simply buy those assets back:

"I don't stand for a paler shade of blue, and I want to look down the barrel and say this: if the Government is going to sell off precious state assets then we would not rule out re-nationalising some of them. And people need to be aware of that regulatory risk.''

When asked by host Guyon Espiner whether he would buy them back, Mr Cunliffe replied "we would look very hard [at buying them back].''

This has of course led to the usual claims that it would be a poor use of government money to buy those assets back at a premium. And it would. Which is why Labour needs to clarify now that it won't be paying a premium for them, and that any buyers will get at most what they paid for them, less any dividends extracted in the meantime. There should be no windfall profits from receiving goods stolen from the New Zealand people.

(The aim here isn't so much to buy assets back, but to discourage purchasers in the first place, by making it clear that they will lose money - undermining the policy by creating regulatory uncertainty. Its something oppositions should do more of. Climate change is another obvious target for this tactic, and the Greens and Labour need to be making noise that any investor who builds polluting industry on the basis of National's subsidies is going to face a very different and far less profitable regulatory environment when there is a change of government)

The standard response to this sort of tactic (voiced by Keith Ng on Twitter last night) is that "reneging on current governments deals would be catastrophic", and that it would "discourage investment". Firstly, buyers of state-owned assets are not investors, they are speculators. The stuff is already built, and all they do is take the profits. They add nothing to the real economy. But more importantly, the government reneges on its predecessors' deals with voters all the time, sometimes with dire individual consequences (student loans. Benefit levels. Conditions of employment. ECE costs. Kiwisaver subsidies. Retirement ages. Just to pick a few examples). Why should transnational capital be immune?

Living in a democracy means accepting that the government can change, and therefore change its mind. And that applies to foreign speculators just as it applies to us. In this case, the current government is planning to do something its voters view as deeply illegitimate. It is entirely right that that policy be reversed, and it is entirely right that those who collaborate in it do so at their own risk. The question is whether Labour will stick up for that, or whether it is simply mouthing empty platitudes.