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There are those who have been saying that Labour will be able to do nothing right for the next year and will be irrelevant until the government's honeymoon fades some time in 2010. Those people haven't got their heads around the fragile state the world is in and the impact it's likely to continue to have on New Zealand this year.
National's honeymoon has been a rare five months of delight, but reality is scratching at the door. If the stubborn world financial crisis isn't bad enough, in the past few weeks National has handed Labour two political gifts; one by necessity, one by bad management.
The first is the run-in to this year's Budget, in particular the government's much-hyped tax cuts.
Earlier in the year, the Prime Minister gave the first hint that tax cuts were back on the negotiating table when he refused to confirm that he would push ahead with the 2010 and 2011 cuts as promised in last year's election campaign. Remember, at the same time as they were promising three years worth of tax cuts, National was saying "it's a fiscally responsible plan. It's fully costed and fully funded".
Not any more, it's not.
The issue got traction at the start of this month when on Q+A Guyon Espiner asked Finance Minister Bill English seven times about his plans for the promised tax cuts and seven times English refused to commit.
As Herald columnist Fran O'Sullivan and former National leader Don Brash have since said on Q+A, those tax cuts are gone .
Many New Zealanders will be forgiving of the government's decision. With Treasury predicting deficits as far as the eye can see and Credit Ratings Agencies circling like vultures, something has to be done.
A recent Business Council for Sustainable Development survey found that 62% of New Zealanders asked didn't want the tax cuts if it meant the government having to borrow more to fund them.
But even if Kiwi voters understand the reason for the government's restraint, that doesn't mean they'll be as understanding when Labour starts hammering the fact that National promised the tax cuts knowing that the world was entering a once-in-a-lifetime recession.
Some will feel that politics overcame good stewardship when National was drawing up its manifesto. Some will feel betrayed, thinking they should go ahead with the cuts regardless.
It was tax cuts, of course, that got National back into the political game after its disastrous 2002 election. They pounded the Labour-led government on the issue for years, creating a huge public groundswell for lower taxes. They will now pay a price for not delivering, even though they will sell the tax cuts as delayed rather than cancelled and even though it is the braver choice.
The government's other gift to the Opposition is the Auckland super city reform.
National is letting ACT and Rodney Hide drive this controversial reform project to minimise any damage to themselves, but it's a faint hope. There's some anger building in South and West Auckland , and as political commentators such as Chris Trotter have pointed out, those areas are crucial to Labour's re-building strategy.
Labour lost its edge in those working class suburbs, looking too pointy-headed beside National's down-to-earth image. This is their path to redemption.
Remarkably, in what looks increasingly like a very sloppy piece of politics, National and ACT elbowed aside the Royal Commission's recommendations and took control of the Auckland local government reforms. Now they'll also have to take the flak.
Labour will be hoping it'll also help them in the Mt Albert by-election .
The question then becomes whether Labour can step up. It's in all of our interests to see the government challenged. When you look at the Auckland reforms, the three strikes law and order policy, the Emissions Trading Scheme review, and the small matter of a fiscal crisis to negotiate, there are some weighty decisions this government is set to make, and they should be probed at every turn. Yet I'm still to be convinced that the Goff Labour Party has the fight in it.
When Phil Goff appeared on Q+A he played a very straight bat. Given the opportunity to start mapping out the post-Clark era, he baulked. The cupboard of new ideas was bare.
But on Morning Report on Wednesday he took on Bill English with relish, sensing at last that the Budget offers Labour a way back from the wilderness of opinion polls in the mid-30s. And this week Labour seems to have achieved a relatively painless U-turn on the Foreshore and Seabed Act review , effectively re-positioning themselves with Maori voters.
Yes, it's been a lovely five month honeymoon for National. But
it's coming to an end.
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