Labour finally gets the message

Political week

By TRACY WATKINS - The Dominion Post

OPINION: It has been a long time since a Labour MP fronted a bunch of blokey bikers baying for blood that wasn't theirs.

So the significance of this week's protest by thousands of bikers angry at ACC levies wasn't lost.

It isn't that it was a revolt against an unpopular government decision.

It takes a mountain of those before voters decide it's time for a change. It was that a year on from their crushing election defeat, Labour MPs were standing alongside a crowd that was several thousand strong, mostly male, and didn't cop an earful.

Because if any group is representative of those the Labour government most alienated during its reign it was the bikers; not just because they were predominantly male, but because they are also conservative and blue collar.

They have been Labour's lost boys since the early 2000s. ACC levies aren't enough to bring them back, of course. But even that small show of solidarity would have been unthinkable under Helen Clark.

If Labour has only just turned the first page on what could prove to be a painfully long stint in Opposition, there were small signs this week it finally gets that. And it's not just about Phil Goff getting very blokey lately.

Its MPs clearly re-entered the political arena after a two-week break with a fresh set of riding instructions.

Keep it simple, stick to the message, and stop trying to win an argument they've already lost. This week was the sharpest they have been in a long time.

Because if explaining is losing, it is no wonder Labour has been on a prolonged losing streak.

Its MPs have spent the last 12 months rehashing their campaign stump lines, defending the fifth Labour government's legacy and remaining unswervingly loyal to the old formula, with the odd regret here and there.

All that has done is give National room to keep running Opposition lines from Government. The same lines that won them an election, in fact.

Labour's campaign against cuts to night school classes is a case in point.

Sure, there were any number of meaningful and worthwhile classes cut that offered a leg-up to those most in need.

But Labour was only preaching to the converted on that one. National's killer riposte is always Moroccan cooking classes - a hark back to the days of hip-hop tours and other nonsense. Argument lost as far as the average bloke in the street is concerned.

It is not hard to see where Labour is going. Like National under John Key, forced to tack back to the centre after its ultra-conservative lurch under Don Brash alienated women and urban liberals, Phil Goff is also reaching out - but to blokes and those provincial New Zealanders alienated by Helen Clark's socially liberal agenda.

The same ones hoovered up by Don Brash.

Opposing ACC levy increases is safe territory of course; Labour views the levy hikes as a precursor to justifying a carve up of ACC. That's die in a ditch stuff for Mr Goff and his colleagues.

Touting changes to monetary policy and announcing the death of the two- party accord is riskier, but not by much.

It might alarm the business sector, but then business has always aligned more comfortably with National anyway.

Out there in battler territory, where cost of living rises are hurting, interest rate hikes hit hardest and the Reserve Bank cops the blame, it might resonate.

On the face of it, Phil Goff's foray into playing the Treaty card is riskier territory. But only on the surface.

His attack on the Government for doing a cosy deal with the Maori Party under the emissions trading scheme might alienate some Maori - but it will resonate with most others.

This is because the biggest benefactors of the deal, which will allow iwi to plant forests on public land, are rich South Island tribe Ngai Tahu. Other iwi are out in the cold.

But it is dog whistle politics all the same. Mr Goff's coded language about "preferential treatment" is targeted at the same crowd who rose up in response to Dr Brash's "one law for all" appeal.

Likewise, Labour's attack on Tariana Turia's whanau ora scheme. But this one is also utu.

Labour could never have got away with a scheme as bold as that which Tariana Turia is negotiating with National.

Hundreds of millions of dollars will be carved out of health and welfare budgets and handed over to grassroots iwi organisations to use as they see fit. Labour's "closing the gaps" strategy tried something similar, if on a much smaller scale.

It was quietly kicked into touch once National's attacks translated into widespread outrage.

Of course, what lost Labour the last election wasn't the desertion of men, it was the desertion of women.

But John Key's grip on the female vote only seems to be getting tighter, not looser. Disastrously for Labour, he is also making inroads deeper into core Labour territory, by picking up a big chunk of Maori support as well.

Labour has no choice but to scavenge in other areas and hope to mop up those among whom the first seeds of disaffection are being planted - over job fears, the rising cost of living, and Hone Harawira's one fingered salute to "white motherf. . .ers".

National's closeness to the Maori Party is an opportunity to drive the first wedge between those voters and the Government.

Will it work? History suggests not. Like National under Bill English - which tacked one way then the other - timing and type are against Phil Goff.

"One law for all" was Bill English's invention, not Dr Brash's. No-one believed it of Mr English. It only rang true when Dr Brash said it.

So it won't avert the need for Labour to go through the painful process of reinventing itself, in the same way that John Key reinvented National and Helen Clark Labour before him.

That reinvention will only come when the likes of Labour's talented new MPs - Grant Robertson, Chris Hipkins, Phil Twyford, Jacinda Ardern and others - are thrust to the forefront.

For now though, we are at least seeing the stirrings of a party that realises it is time to start letting go of the past.