Key a real thorn in Clark's side

John Key's Budget reply was a performance of great conviction. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Something exciting is developing between John Key and Helen Clark in Parliament's debating chamber. Their contest is becoming more even.

With Key's confidence growing daily, he is waging battle unscripted, the political equivalent of medieval jousting without armour.

National's benches can barely contain themselves now they have, in Key, someone who has the confidence and ability to foot it with a Prime Minister who is always prepared. But he is doing more than just foot it. After six months as leader, he is exceeding party expectations inside and outside Parliament.

National's leader is rousing curiosity - about 750 people turned out to hear him speak on Thursday night in Tauranga, almost matching the sort of crowds Muldoon and Winston Peters drew there in their heyday.

Key leaves Parliament most Thursdays to meet the country he stands a good chance of running next year, after returning from overseas only six years ago. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are a treat for his team in the House when he is there and when he is firing.

The swag of National newcomers who arrived in 2005 knew nothing other than the mannerly Dr Brash, who would no sooner thump a tub in the House than dance the jive. Having John Key lead them has been like gaining a new sense they didn't know they had.

They holler and hoot when their Blue Knight dents the Lady in Red, which is happening more and more. The hollering is especially exaggerated when Michael Cullen, the Black Knight, feels the need to intervene to ask Clark a question - a device to get across a point that she clearly has not made.

That happened twice on Wednesday. That day, Key brought a single piece of paper with him to the House with half a dozen scripted follow-up questions to the formal one he asked Clark, a question that sought to skew the KiwiSaver debate back to Labour's non-existent record on personal tax-cuts, except possibly in election year.

He barely glanced at the paper. Mostly he listened to Clark's answers, then attacked them. After nine questions to Clark he screwed up his piece of paper and took his seat again, knees jiggling and fingers tapping, justifiably satisfied that he had more than matched her.

Key has never been more admired by his MPs than last week when he unleashed his reply to the Budget speech. He had two hours to absorb and reply to a complex document that Cullen and an army of officials spent months preparing, and he nailed the issue and the politics with a gutsy and raw reaction.

Even when he is not working, he is working. Returning from a holiday in Japan (Kyoto perhaps?) he had read all there was to read about climate change and had nutted out National's policy in an area fraught with technical and political difficulty.