OPINION
Labour’s election year began with the most unorthodox government play on record — replacing not just the Prime Minister, but publicly burning her most cherished policies in two high-profile bonfires. A third is promised, with Three Waters heading to the pyre.
National knew – or should have, since its own research said so – that Christopher Luxon would beat Jacinda Ardern in a policy-free popularity contest.
By the time she quit, enough voters had worked out that, when it came to running a government rather than emoting, she was a complete flake. Her Government’s failure to deliver anything meant her net favourability score was below zero, with Luxon’s.
Yet despite knowing how unpopular Ardern was and putting it about that she would quit, National was surprised when it happened. Along with the remaining small pockets of Jacindamaniacs in Pt Chev, Te Aro and surrounds, National strategists bizarrely thought it made the election a gimme.
After all, if Luxon could beat Ardern in a popularity contest, surely he’d trounce Chris Hipkins?
Alas for National, Hipkins is highly popular. Simple relief that Ardern has gone is a factor, with polls giving her no residual support. But that doesn’t change the fact that Hipkins’ net favourability is now 35 points ahead of Luxon’s. Even among National supporters, more like Hipkins than don’t.
The good news is National has finally worked out that it can’t win a beauty contest between the two. Perhaps by necessity, it delivered yesterday what pundits and voters say we want, which is meaningful policy.
If a government ditching its prime minister and main policies is unorthodox, an opposition releasing serious policy is more so, especially so early in an election year. It hasn’t happened this century.
Luxon may be irritated with speculation that his education spokesperson Erica Stanford is a leadership contender, along with his deputy and finance spokesperson Nicola Willis. But New Zealand’s last two important prime ministers, Jim Bolger and Helen Clark, endured speculation throughout their times as opposition leader about Winston Peters, Ruth Richardson, Doug Graham, Michael Cullen and Phil Goff.
Luxon can take comfort that such talk at least suggests a deep bench. That’s not something National has been accused of since John Key, Bill English and Steven Joyce left.
The chosen topic feels sincere. Education doesn’t make the top issues concerning voters, according to National’s pollsters, Curia. It’s a lowly 11th in Ipsos’ New Zealand Issues Monitor.
Moreover, the policy itself is genuinely statesmanlike, being concerned with outcomes that will fully bear fruit only once Luxon, Willis and Stanford are retired. It doesn’t read as if it was bashed out on Wednesday night after some focus groups. It may even be, as claimed, the outcome of Luxon and Stanford’s personal research over the last year, including in Asia and Europe.
There are no handouts cynically targeted at the median voter, although taxpayers will bear the $10 million annual cost of teacher registration fees rather than teachers themselves.
The core promise is to restore acceptable performance among 12-year-olds by 2030, with a goal of 80 per cent of them being at or above the expected curriculum level for their age in reading, writing, maths and science by the end of intermediate school.
The same cohort will be expected to be in the world’s top 10 in maths, reading and science by 2033, as measured by the OECD’s internationally recognised PISA rankings.
That these are in fact ambitious goals underlines the disastrous decline in student performance over the past 15 years. The policy document doesn’t hide the fact that the big collapse in standards coincided with Key’s first term, continuing ever since. His education ministers’ sloganeering about a handful of national standards and calamitous “modern learning environments” did nothing to reverse it.
In a world where we hope each generation will be better than the one before, the data National has obtained reveals that the average 13-year-old in 2019 was actually worse at both maths and science than in 1995. Performance will continue deteriorating as Ardern’s and Hipkins’ Covid kids reach intermediate and secondary school.
But the policy doesn’t brainlessly promise vast billions to fix this. It recognises that far-left education theory, not money, is the problem. As Luxon points out, Grant Robertson has increased education spending by 46 per cent since 2017, from $11.1 billion to $16.2b. The extra $5.1b has had similar results to Robertson’s $1.9b more for mental health.
Nor is head office restructuring and rebranding promised, as Labour focuses on, or changes to school management or teacher payment methods, as right-wing economists might prefer. Instead, the policy is about the nuts and bolts of curriculum reform, initial and ongoing teacher training, new classroom materials and resources, and assessment.
Central is clarity about what students should know and be able to do at each year of school, and clear guidance to teachers on what to teach. Teachers will be trained specifically on how to deliver the back-to-basics curriculum, and provided with new high-quality teaching resources to do so from a “central resource bank” as in Finland.
Sufficient flexibility will remain for teachers and schools to target lessons to specific students and communities, but they will no longer be expected to design their own teaching plans to meet bold yet empty curriculum aspirations.
The policy can’t help but be popular with parents and ordinary teachers.
It is also detailed and substantial enough to deserve a serious response from Labour and the Greens, plus Te Pāti Māori, which polls currently identify as king-maker.
But, politically, Labour dare not steal National’s policy because its focus on measurability is anathema to the teacher union bosses and ultra-left education theorists who control the bureaucracy and university education departments, and who easily trump students, parents and regular teachers as the education stakeholders Labour most cares about.
Luxon has now delivered two education policies, a less-impressive attempt on early childhood education and yesterday’s high-quality effort on schools. Trades training, including how to unravel Hipkins’ disastrous polytechnic merger, and restoring New Zealand’s rapidly falling world university rankings will follow.
Just as National strategists initially had no idea how to respond to Labour’s unorthodox leadership change and policy bonfires, it can be assured no one in the Beehive has any idea what to do if an opposition suddenly starts taking policy seriously. At the very least, National’s bold strike yesterday promises to mix things up a bit – and hopefully avoid Te Pāti Māori deciding whether or not any of it will happen.
Now do microeconomic reform, including tougher competition law for banks, supermarkets and oil companies.
- Matthew Hooton has previously worked for the National and Act parties, and the Mayor of Auckland.