AUGUST 10 2019 LISTENER 17
CH
RIS (^) S
LA
NE
was often to superimpose checklists and targets
on them, and aspirational new descriptors such as
“one-stop-shop”.
An example was one of Parliament’s current
reform priorities, the system to track and risk-
proof the movement of livestock, which National
introduced in 2012. It soon became clear it was
too easy for farmers to circumvent and too hard
for regulators to police. The devastating spread of
Mycoplasma bovis cattle disease later put an excla-
mation mark after that knowledge. But what was
well understood by all ministers outside the kitchen
cabinet was that, unless a flawed law or system was
screamingly urgent right this minute, they mustn’t
pester Key’s top team for legislative time.
Former Finance Minister Bill English’s data-
driven social investment work was one of the few
policy zones that justified Key’s favourite motif of
“step change”. His Government relied heavily on
population growth, consumption and house-price
inflation to produce reassuring-seeming growth
and employment figures, even while productivity
- the only dependable generator of wealth – was
stagnating.
JUST A LITTLE RESPECT
Although it remains to be seen whether the
Government can do any better,
Bridges knows it’s not enough for
National simply to sit back and
hope to capitalise on the coalition’s
missteps. That simply invites the
question, “And what were you doing
about X for those nine years in the
Beehive?” Voters can see that many of
the administration’s current embar-
rassments are legacies of National’s
failure to act in a timely fashion- which, incidentally, made the
conference’s showcase new cancer-
funding policy a colossal cheek,
though no less welcome for it.
Bridges will just have to follow
Helen Clark’s long plod from being
only dimly understood and tolerated
to being highly respected – a path she
stayed on only by steadily improving
her communication skills, unify-
ing her MPs and picking her issues
carefully.
Unlike Clark, Bridges will have to
start that self-improvement campaign
within his caucus, where patience
has worn thin with his brusque
management style and erratic public
performances.
Clark’s other trick was always to
behave and speak like the PM-in-wait-
ing. As one MP privately complained
of Bridges, “People don’t want to see
the PM-in-waiting talking about [can-
nabis] gummy bears and slushies.”
Well, maybe not this one. Key
could have gushed about the latest
Love Island at his post-Cabinet press
conference and still been admired.
Lacking such natural appeal, Bridges
will just have to show he’s a slogger,
and hope that in time, when people
call this slogger “Soymun”, they
mean it affectionately. Though prob-
ably not Judith. lJohn Key could have
gushed about the
latest Love Island at
his post-Cabinet press
conference and still
been admired.