Britain usually has one every five years but, given its situation, perhaps that is no panacea.
Here the first year is spent figuring out what to do. The second year is meant to be the year of action or delivery as Labour termed it.
They were criticised for their lack of delivery, particularly housing but in the rural sector we saw too much delivery with a new policy affecting us popping up monthly, it seemed.
Mind you, John Key promised to reform the Resource Management Act and create new water storage, neither of which happened. We could do with that Ruataniwha Dam now.
And, of course, the third year can become one long election campaign. And they are into it already.
This will be a very close election but when one looks back at nearly all MMP elections and even many of the first past the post elections, they could all have gone either way.
The last FPP election in 1993 is a good example. Mike Moore, who has just died and is fondly remembered as the person who embraced free trade after the Muldoon protectionist era and ended up heading the World Trade Organisation, took Labour’s vote to within 0.5% of National’s.
Jim Bolger ended up with a one-seat majority and was able to get Labour’s Peter Tapsell to be speaker so he could govern. That term of government voted for MMP, started with four parties and ended with seven and an independent as the jostle for positioning ahead of MMP began.
Simon Bridges’ announcement he will not form a government with NZ First was inevitable.
An announcement closer to the election would have had better impact and reduced Peters’ ability to spin it all year but the question of would he or wouldn’t he would have dominated every stand-up Bridges gave.
He’s the man who took Tauranga off Winston. The Nats haven’t forgiven him for negotiating with them after the last election and at the same time lodging a court action against two of their MPs. For good reason they say they can’t trust him and will hammer at that theme all year.
Ruling NZ First out of a National-led government has the objective of being to drive the NZ First vote close to or below 5%. Right leaning NZ First voters might shift to National to prevent a centre-left government or, if they do fall below 5%, other parties proportionally pick up that wasted vote, which might inch National closer to the unattainable 50% along with a seat or two from Act.
Peters is already out of the blocks reminding us Bolger sacked him as a cabinet minister in one term and rang him up and formed an MMP coalition in another but any co-operation between the two parties now seems incredibly unlikely. And, of course, NZ First will reasonably argue that they can act as a handbrake on a Labour/Greens bloc.
Key ruled Peters out in 2008 but Bridges is not Key and Bridges doesn’t have the Maori Party and United Future in his cupboard. Act will keep the one seat with the deal from National and maybe get up enough to bring another MP in on the list.
The other difficulty with trying to drive NZ First’s vote down is that they will be putting in a concerted effort to win back the Northland electorate as an insurance policy. Shane Jones has said he is keen to give it a crack and though Jacinda Ardern has ruled out doing a deal like National and Act in Epsom, watch that policy abruptly change closer to the election should NZ First’s polling look fragile. National wont be in the position to argue the ethics of such a move.
National’s and NZ First’s antipathy to each other could overshadow the battle between the two major parties.
National’s other dilemma is whether to engage in the negative style politics that has been seen to be so successful in the United States, Britain and Australia. Their recent ads indicate they probably will.
Ardern has said she will refrain from that sort of campaign and might become known as The Great Deflector but time will tell.
Finally, I note with some pleasure that election day is not only the 127th anniversary of NZ Suffrage but is also International Talk Like a Pirate Day.
I’m going to start a campaign to inject some levity into proceedings because we will need it by then and I suggest all election officials be dressed as pirates and greet voters with “Ahoy, me hearties.”
