Last Wednesday, while the clowns continued the circus negotiations, the saga was still funny. The next day, they announced that negotiations had concluded, and the coalition agreement would be signed the next day. On Friday, the agreement was signed, and today the Governor General swore the new Prime Minister and other ministers into office. The “Speech from the Throne”, which is part of the royal opening of Parliament, will be next week.
Apparently the delay last week was because David Seymour, leader of the hard-right “libertarian-ish Act Party, and Winston Peters, leader of the righting populist New Zealand First party, both thought they should be Deputy Prime Minister. David thought he should get it because he has many more MPs in his party’s caucus than Winston has in his, and supposedly Winston thought he should have it because he’s been in politics for many, many decades, dating way back to when New Zealand was ruled by the Queen (Elizabeth, not Victoria, as perhaps some people might assume…). This is, by the way, the first NZ government to swear an oath of allegiance to any monarch other than Queen Elizabeth II since the middle of the last century.
National Party leader and newly sworn in Prime Minister, Chris Luxon, arranged for David and Winston to share the job. Winston will be Deputy PM for the first 18 months, and then David will take over for the remaining approximately 18 months of the term (assuming, of course, the government lasts 18 months or more). This situation is as absurd as it sounds, but there could be a method to the madness—for one of the two, anyway. Writing in an opinion piece on the website of TVNZ’s 1News, veteran journalist John Campbell said:
Winston Peters gets to be Deputy Prime Minister first, of course. Whoever’s responsible for that is either Winston Peters himself, or someone without a particularly robust understanding of our history. Peters campaigns best when he’s in opposition. New Zealand First has never, once, been returned to government after being in a coalition. Any remote chance of retaining his loyal participation in (to use his least favourite phrase) “Cabinet collective responsibility” would have been enhanced by making him deputy at the end of the three years, not at the beginning. It’s harder to go rogue when you’re second in charge. But his bauble time will be over. (This ain’t his first rodeo.)The entirety of Campbell’s piece is worth reading, as are several others. Here’s are some more: Former journalist Vernon Small’s piece for The Sunday Star-Times, ”The results are in and it’s Winston by a length” also looks at the shape of the new government. Glenn McConnell, political reporter for Stuff, pointed out the ”5 surprising policies buried in the National, ACT, NZF coalition agreements”, and the news organisation’s chief political correspondent, Tova O’Brien, pointed out the absurdities in the public signing of the coalition agreement (it was pretty much Winston’s show). Finally, Gordon Campbell’s ”On The New Government’s Policies Of Yesteryear”, published on Scoop pretty much sums up the National’s coalition partners, and so, why the coalition took the shape it did:
For all the media attention paid to the Seymour v Peters personal conflict, a large number of crossovers exist between the hidebound conservatism of New Zealand First and the Thatcherite young fogey-ism of ACT. Both parties are actively hostile to any form of identity politics, both detest any expressions of indigenous rights, and both oppose any forms of affirmative action being taken to address the existing levels of ethnic or gender dis-advantage.I did not vote for the circus, of course, and so, I cannot wish the new government “well”, because that would mean wishing them success, something I cannot do: Success would mean taking actions I absolutely oppose. So, I wish them good health instead. The indestructible Winston doesn’t need such wishes despite being 78, and perhaps David doesn’t either (rightwing politicians rigid ideological certainty seems to be a life-enhancing force for them, though less so their supporters). No, it’s Chris Luxon who needs the wishes of good health. He will have an enormous job merely trying to keep his new playmates under control, Winston alone being a full-time job. Preserving his own well-being while serving as ringmaster for his circus will require his attention and a lot of energy, and for that much he deserves good wishes.
While much of this post was written with my tongue firmly in my cheek (so much so my tongue got cramp), there’s a dark reason for that: The next three years will be painful. So much of what the three intend to do is divisive and will cause a lot of bitter anger, particularly among Māori, but also workers, Rainbow communities, those who care about fighting climate change, and who want action on child poverty, all of whom will be worse off under this government. My concern, though, isn’t that—the next Left-of-Centre government can fix everything the circus destroys, except, maybe, for one thing: The circus’ policies may make more hardcore followers feel they have permission to unleash aggressive, even violent, hatred, just as the leader of the USA’s Republican Party did.
Still, there’s one thing that gives me hope. We had no riots today, no one tried to violently stop the new government. We had no one bleating on that the election was “stolen”. Right on schedule, the caretaker Prime Minister, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins, whose Labour Party lost the election this year, rang the Governor General to formally end the caretaker government’s roll. The new government was then duly sworn in. I didn’t vote for any of them, and while I have grave concerns about how much harm that they will do, that peaceful and orderly transfer of power gives me hope that New Zealand might avoid the fate of so many countries that are falling under the thrall of the far-right, including overt fascists. I suppose the next election will show whether that hope was justified.
No comments:
Post a Comment