Polity by Rob Salmond

John Key’s a political poker player, and in poker there’s an old maxim about projection. When people are stuck in weak position, they go out of their way to project strength. It's how you try to get out of a tricky position.

We’ve seem plenty that from him in Parliament already. 

From the outside, Parliament’s question time might look like a battle of ideas between government and opposition MPs, with the media observing from the sidelines. But it isn’t. No MP seriously thinks their questions and responses are going to sway the opinions of the people across the aisle.

Question time is actually a bizarre love triangle, with the government and opposition courting the affections of the media. Media don’t report on who won the prize; the media reports are the prize.

That’s why it’s helpful to think about Key’s answers to questions so far.

Andrew Little’s been concentrating on promoting his three years fee-free study policy. A representative Key response:

From what I can see from Labour’s trumped-up policy it announced on a Sunday afternoon—which is getting no traction so they keep coming to the House with it… go and have a look at the column inches and see how many you have got: zero.

There’s two claims in there: First, Labour’s getting “zero” column inches and no traction with its policy. And second, it’s a sign of weakness when you ask about an issue in Parliament.

Both claims are silly, and pretty obviously silly. On the idea that nobody cares for Labour’s announcement, for example:

Rachel Smalley:

Labour needed to start the year with a splash and so it did. It announced three years of free education… A reduction in student debt is a good thing. People will enter the workforce owing less, and that has to be a good thing. More people will study, and anything driving up the numbers of tertiary -educated people is a bonus.

Vernon Small on Stuff:

Labour's first major policy announcement of the year is in, giving Andrew Little the "speech-idol" laurels at the start of the political year… So far National has tried a number of attack lines on the "fee-free three" idea, but it has looked more like flailing than finely-honed critique. 

NZ Herald editorial:

If National wants to argue at next year's election that an entitlement to three years' free tertiary education is unaffordable, it cannot be offering tax cuts. If it thinks a tax cut will be more appealing to voters than relief from student fees and loans, it may be mistaken.

So much for “no traction” and “zero column inches.” Key would, of course, much rather live in a world where Labour’s start to the year had got no traction. That just isn’t the world he’s actually living in.

Key’s second idea, that parties bring their weak issues to the House rather than their strong ones, runs counter to everything we know about courtship. If you’re in a bizarre love triangle with the news media, you put your best foot forward, not your weakest.

We know this from Key’s own behavior when he was opposition leader. In 2008 his three top question time topics were tax cuts, the Winston Peters / Owen Glenn scandal, and the number of Kiwis moving to Australia. Do those sounds like National’s weak points from 2008? Not so much.

So, if the claims are so silly, then why is Key making them?

It’s because he wants to bluff the media into reporting that Labour’s policy is “getting no traction” has “zero column inches” and so on. He’s betting that the media are bluffable, and that he can change the media’s narrative from the top down. There may have been a time when that he could bluff some commentators that way. It was part of his long political honeymoon. But, like Audrey Young, I think that time is over.

Key protesteth too much that Labour’s fee-free is a dog. It’s a tacit admission the policy’s doing well. It’s weakness projecting as strength.

I went tramping this past weekend. A quick overnight jaunt with a friend up an ill-frequented Tararua river valley. In a sunny summer weekend, we saw only four people in two days.

We got lost a few times, shared a hut with a French fisherman and a couple of world-class snorers, bathed in a butt-numbing river, and aired our views on politicians from Judith Collins to Donald Trump, movies from Avatar to The Road, Lego sets from 80s fire stations to 21^st century Darth Vaders, to and a host of our other obsessions, too.

I went away earlier in the year, too, camping at the back of a farm, using a stream as an automatic beer-chiller, and following a sparsely marked creek-bed track up the Rimutakas’ only mountain, all within 25 kms of downtown Wellington.

I wish I could do it more.

Tramping is one of the great bits about living here again. For me, it’s something that makes New Zealand feel like a home. When I lived in the US, I tried to explain “tramping” to my friends a couple of times. From the name, they thought it was a euphemism for seeking out prostitutes. From there, the pitch was assuredly doomed.

It’s such a New Zealand thing to do, tramping. Even though plenty of countries have hills and tracks and people blundering around on them, the tramping culture around New Zealand, especially the etiquette around shared huts, is very much our own.

For quite a few Kiwi kids, it’s also a place of great bonding with their parents. It’s a place where Mum or Dad start to become friends and mortals, rather than authority figures.

Some of my best adolescent moments with my Dad came in the backcountry.

Dad will admit he’s never been a gourmet cook. But, out and about, he tried to teach me backcountry haute cuisine. Often it involved a lot of potato flakes, Hutton’s Double Cheese Sizzlers, or freeze-dried lamb and peas, but sometimes we got a bit adventurous.

Our showoff specialty was the “River-Chilled Sara Lee,” which involved carefully balancing a packet-mix cheesecake inside a dry bag, moored in a suitable a chilly stream. The success rate was only about a quarter, but when we got it right we were the envy of the hut.

Another time Dad tried to teach me how to cook mussels, which was a great idea except he had no idea how to cook mussels. We paddled around the shore in Pelorus Sound gathering the biggest, oldest mussels we could find. Because they’re bigger! That was mistake 1. Then we steamed then until they opened. Then we threw the mussels in with some Continental Pasta and Sauce – Al Fredo if I’m not mistaken – and simmered them for 10 minutes. Mistakes 2 and 3. Mistake 2: Cheese and shellfish. Mistake 3: Drastic overcooking!

The next day we decided to marinate the mussels in some scotch. Because maybe that’s why they were tough the previous day. Mistake! They went even more horribly tough. In disgust, we threw them out onto the ground.

Soon, a weka came by and ate one. He got instantly, utterly drunk. He tried to run away, but he couldn’t away– he just kept running at a bank and tumbling over backwards. Poor weka. Soon he was asleep in the middle of the campsite, and stayed there until we went to bed. When we woke the next day he was gone, hopefully on the walk of weka shame home.

Not all our trips revolved around murdering cuisine. We ranged more widely than that. But across the twenty or so tramping trips I’ve done with my Dad, I learned much of what I know about him. Not as “my Dad,” but as “him.” It’s such a formative thing.

One of my own goals as a Dad is to get my girls enthused about the backcountry. Every time I take Miss-The-Elder for a walk, it’s “practice tramping.” I’m hopeful she’ll come to share my passion, and Miss-the-Younger will get into it, too. 

It does worry me a bit that all the urbanization and automation and technological brilliance in our society could dull our kids’ enthusiasm for their national backyard and its simple pleasures. It’s so special, and it deserves to be both enjoyed and protected.

Matthew Hooton has a new theory of the Labour party (NBR: paywalled). It goes like this: The scary-sounding “extreme left,” fresh from suiciding the Alliance, have invaded the Labour Party with the intent of murdering it from within, with the result that the Green Party will control the government. No, seriously, that’s his theory. Methinks he’s been watching too many zombie flicks.

That theory, according to Hooton, explains why Labour has dangerous radicals like Andrew Little in charge, and why it espouses Soviet ideas like agreeing with world-leading economists on the TPP, and like lowering the cost of something everyone wants more people to have.

The two biggest planks of Matthew’s theory are also its two biggest flaws. They are: (1) Labour’s leaders are extreme left; and (2) Labour’s policy is extreme left.

Andrew Little’s biggest success pre-politics was to convince Air New Zealand not to shut its aircraft maintenance facility in Auckland. Thanks to Little’s intervention and cooperation as Secretary of the then-Engineers’ Union, it stayed open under new employment conditions. Now Air New Zealand enjoys a reputation as a world leader in plane maintenance, bringing an added profit stream, while hundreds of skilled jobs stayed in Auckland. It’s hardly anti-business behaviour.

In December, Little met with economist Jeffrey Sachs to discuss, among other things, TPP. Sachs told Little that he couldn’t bring himself to support the deal, because of all the behind the border fishhooks. Jeff Sachs said that. Joseph Stiglitz has the same position, as he stated last month in The Guardian:

In 2016, we should hope for the TPP’s defeat and the beginning of a new era of trade agreements that don’t reward the powerful and punish the weak.

Jo Stiglitz and Jeff Sachs - pro free trade, but anti TPP. Look those two guys up – they’re hardly fringe economists. Is Hooton really suggesting Stiglitz and Sachs are “extreme left” because they, like Labour, oppose TPP? If so, it says more about Hooton than about anyone else.

Most people also recognize it’s important than ever that more New Zealanders have advanced education. As machines and algorithms make ever more jobs obsolete, people need the smarts and ability to do jobs that aren’t easily replaced. As an economy, we get more educated or we get more dead. And if we want people to have more of something, one of the most time-tested ways to achieve it is to lower the price.

To sum it up: “Education’s important, and we should have more of it, so we’re making it easier to get.” Radical stuff! If Matthew wants to call that insight far left lunacy, then he’s welcome to.

Now, I don’t say this as a card-carrying member of Hooton’s so-called “extreme left” clique. Given certain events, I’m pretty sure I’d be refused membership even if I applied. Nonetheless I’m interested in Matthew’s column. Why bother putting such an obviously silly theory into the public domain?

I think it’s a clumsy attempt to change the subject. Labour’s education policy is getting too much traction for the right’s liking – they’d rather we were talking about something else. Enter Matthew’s cooked up story of Machiavellian shenanigans inside his opponents, as a lumbering distraction.

I like it when the right-wing cheer squad is reduced to conspiracy theories about the left. That tactic is the refuge of someone who wants the conversation to change. It’s a defensive gambit, and usually an unsuccessful one.

Hello, I’m Rob Salmond and this is Polity on Public Address. Welcome.

I’ll be blogging here about politics most of all, but with a dose of sports, parenting, and miscellany thrown in. I’m really grateful to Russell for sharing his shiny webspace with me, and to you the readers for engaging with my earlier posts so energetically. You’ve made almost 3,000 comments to date across my 31 Speaker posts, with 10 of those posts attracting over 100 contributions apiece. Sincerely, thank you. 

My day job is as an analytics and communications consultant. I own my own small business, also called Polity. I’m part geek, part comms guy. It’s a fun job, with a wide range of tasks that run all the way from algorithm to zeitgeist. 

One of my firm’s clients is the Labour leader’s office in Parliament. As well as my current work for Andrew Little, in the past I’ve worked for David Cunliffe, David Shearer, and Helen Clark. I’ve worked on Labour campaigns since 1996, and I’m a proud member of the party.  I’m a Labour guy.

That means yes, I have an agenda. And no, I’m not a dispassionate, neutral observer. If that’s not your cup of tea, then thanks for reading this far, and enjoy the rest of PA and the rest of the internet.

My own personal views, however, are not the same as my party’s. For any thinking person, that’s inevitable. I differ from Labour on tax and on trade, on social policy and on the environment. But, having said that, I prefer my party’s package to any other party’s.

That’s why yes, I choose to fight publically for individual policies I wouldn’t choose if I were dictator. Those things are part of a package, and I think that package is the best on offer. I fight for improvement, not perfection.

If I were to spend too much time publicly picking internal fights over small differences, it wouldn’t help us win external fights over large differences. I choose to fight the broader fights, and ignore some – but not all – of the smaller ones.

I know many others – including lots of PA readers – choose instead to fight for very specific policy outcomes. That’s an honourable, important quest. I respect they work they do; it’s just not the work I do.

Before working around Parliament, I lived in the US for twelve years, studying then teaching political science. I learned about the intricacies of data analysis and research design, the absurdities of the presidential primary campaign, and the joy of college football. My academic nerdery is archived here.

I’m also a Dad. I’ve had three daughters. Sophie isn’t with us any more, as I’ve written about here. My other two girls – who when they appear on this blog will be simply Miss-The-Elder and Miss-The-Younger – are currently five and two, and bring me much happiness-and-other-emotions.

So, what can you expect from me on this blog? Well, my earlier Speaker posts for PA provide a good guide:

• About 60% have been about New Zealand politics (30% about the government, 20% about Labour; 10% about the general scene), while about 25% have been about international politics, and 15% about other topics including food, movies, and personal things.

• Within the political posts, about half are on questions of strategy, where I’ve often said things some Labour supporters don’t like, while about a third are on policy issues, and the remaining sixth are on issues of competence.

I expect to post more or less along these lines on PA in the future, maybe with a heavier US focus this year as the Presidential election heats up, a heavier NZ focus next year as our own election gets near, and a bit more personal stuff if I get brave.

I’m looking forward to engaging with you all. If I can provide you with posts you want to read, then I get the great benefit of learning from you in the comments. My hope is it’s a win/win.

See you round the PA café!

-Rob

As readers know, Labour leader Andrew Little has announced a policy for three free years of post-school education. As a person who helped a little with preparing for that launch, my own views on the policy won’t be a surprise. It’s the right thing to do because the ability to retrain will be crucial in years ahead. It’s smart politics as well, because it’s Labour setting the agenda from opposition.

In this post, I want to look at the reaction that came from National and ACT. That reaction is very revealing about their election strategy for 2017.

The critique was as shrill as it was immediate. Stephen Joyce decided that the government subsidy of tuition costs would “achieve absolutely nothing,” whereas of course every dollar he spends on a lower level of exactly the same subsidy is highly effective. It was the emptiest of empty critiques.

David Seymour had Chicken Little declarations about course quality – saying any and all controls and checks would go out the window with this policy, and that anyone who could write “Ewe gots a qualafakashun” on a cocktail napkin would automatically get a government cheque for $15,000. It’s as if Labour had accidentally also scrapped NZQA.

And David Farrar intoned darkly about opportunity costs, as if doing something about access to post-school education necessarily rules out doing something for pre-school kids. On that score, I personally am 100% for extending free ECE to kids of a lower age, and extending the subsidy even further for vulnerable kids. But let’s see just how deeply David Farrar cares about the tradeoffs for toddlers when National announces its tax cuts…

The real reason National is so upset with this policy is that it means National itself will need to tack more left in order to keep winning.

David Farrar’s blog title “Labour goes even further left” could just as easily have been “National has to go even further left.” And Bill English talked explicitly to Politik’s Richard Harman [paywall] about this strategy last week. Talking about National’s social investment strategy, English said:

… it aligns with our politics because the left is fully engaged with us. A lot them like it. One said to me the other day I’ve got to stop talking to you guys because you are messing with my political head. At the very least the left is not attacking us. And they are not advocating for Labour’s supposed strong suite and that’s its social policy.

So that’s National’s plan – hope to copy just enough of Labour’s social policy to stop left activists being angry with them. It’s an acknowledgement that Labour is better than National at thinking about social policy.

So the more strong social policy Labour rolls out, the more National has to copy.

I expect you’ll see more from Labour on social policy during the year, as it builds both its platform and its corps of volunteers in advance of the 2017 campaign. I expect you’ll see real boldness from Labour in those areas. In other areas, I expect you’ll see a bit more caution, though. Labour’s ability to deliver a bold social programme relies on broad public acceptance of Labour’s credibility on the economy, on personal security, and so on.

From this weekend, National knows that policies to increase the availability of advanced education are popular across the board. They’re especially popular among parents and grandparents who can see education is even more important for their mokopuna than for any previous generation.

For National that means they’ll need another “me, too” response before next year’s election. They’ll offer a partial version of Labour’s policy, in a bid to mollify the middle-ground.

In one sense, I’m quite pleased about that. Even when Labour’s out of office, it sill makes the running in social policy in New Zealand. Setting the direction; identifying the priorities.

But the problem is that when National plays “me, too,” it only takes half-measures. When a problem calls for bold action, this government isn’t equipped to do what’s needed. The head-shakingly laughable climate change “fast follower” proposal is the classic example.

All in all, National’s reaction shows it really is concerned about the impact of Labour’s policy. When its perfunctory attempts to discredit it fail, they’ll move pretty swiftly to copy it instead.