NZ ready for post-Ardern change

The New Zealand election finally will draw a line under the Jacinda Ardern experiment and bring political change to our close neighbour and friend. Whatever the result, it will have consequences for our strategic interests and hold valuable lessons for our domestic politicians. Ms Ardern is living proof that rock-star politics is not enough.

The economic consequences of her management of the pandemic still are being felt. Interest rates in New Zealand are higher and its economic prospects bleaker. Ms Ardern’s signature promise to deliver hundreds of thousands of low-cost houses has been an abject failure. Sensing the end, Ms Ardern quit politics in January and made only a brief intrusion into the election campaign via a Facebook video from Massachusetts. The polls predict a crushing defeat for her Labour successor, Chris Hipkins, who has failed to right the sinking economic ship he inherited. They also suggest reanimation of the ultimate political stayer, Winston Peters, who once again could emerge as kingmaker. National Party leader Christopher Luxon most likely will need the support of Mr Peters’ New Zealand First party to form government under the country’s complex voting system.

If Mr Luxon wins, his challenge will be to address the cost-of-living crisis, affordable housing and economic management issues that have defined the election campaign. A former chief executive of Air New Zealand, Mr Luxon is still largely an unknown political quantity. He has sold himself as a turnaround expert and may appeal to voters as a safer pair of hands on the economic levers following years of Labour socialist-style mismanagement. The New Zealand business community, however, is holding back its judgment. Australia’s interests will be well served if a new government in our Five Eyes alliance partner finally is prepared to adopt a more mature attitude to its geopolitical responsibilities. This includes beefing up its defence and security apparatus, and finally ending the ban on visiting nuclear-powered ships. Like other nations in the region, New Zealand must ensure it has the right balance in its dealings with China, which holds a disproportionate position in New Zealand’s trade.

Defeat for Labour would make it the first government to lose power after only two terms since mixed-member proportional voting was introduced in 1993. The pandemic can explain some of this but there are bigger lessons. Ms Ardern’s heart-over-head approach to government was always more popular overseas than it was at home. Political capital was wasted chasing unrealistic goals. She has left deep divisions including the introduction of a co-governance model giving additional powers to indigenous Maori that has had to be wound back. The lesson for Anthony Albanese is to not follow the Ardern road but to focus more clearly on what voters really care about. That is the same in New Zealand as it is here. Cost of living first, second and third.