By AUDREY YOUNG
With a little less of "this" and a little more of "that," Jenny Shipley's first speech in Parliament for the year could have been a personal best.
The National Party leader sounded like the Leader of the Opposition in the House for once.
On the heels of last week's high-energy strategy caucus in Napier - and relaxed from the Hollies' concert in Napier on Saturday - she was breathing fire and confidence.
The only people more gobsmacked than her own MPs were those on the Government benches.
Their jeers were as much oxygen to Mrs Shipley as her own party's vocal support.
No first-day nerves were betrayed, as they usually are.
No blunders were evident, as they often are, until the last five minutes when she unthinkingly said: "This speech is a huge disappointment."
What she meant was "that" speech, the one Prime Minister Helen Clark had just delivered.
The howls of laughter at the self-inflicted insult broke the fever that Mrs Shipley had whipped up.
Despite the blue, it was a rare example of Mrs Shipley not only in command but in control in the House.
It is perhaps the only time her imperiousness can be used to advantage.
She attacked Helen Clark's public relations skills:
"The speech we have listened to this afternoon is a triumph of spin over substance. The spinster of New Zealand politics has a new passion phrase, the passion for economic transformation."
Then it became personal: "The Queen of Spin; the spinster of this Parliament," Mrs Shipley called her.
The National leader had been wound up by Helen Clark stealing her language. "Passion" has never been one of the Prime Minister's favourites until now, let alone being passionate about economic transformation.
Then there were the ideas:
"I had to listen to the Prime Minister say, 'We live in a global labour market'," thundered Mrs Shipley.
"Well, Prime Minister, go down to the Nelson port and tell people there that they live in a global labour market.
"They don't even live in a New Zealand labour market.
"The exporters of the Nelson province are not allowed the advantage of a competitive New Zealand labour market, let alone a global labour market.
"Give us a break, for heaven's sake. Make the rhetoric match what you are actually saying you intend to do."
Mrs Shipley felt confident enough to have a go at Education Minister Trevor Mallard, calling him a "union lackey."
"Rugby union," he corrected her, fresh from his half-hearted pie-and-pint protest against the Fiji sevens team.
She even ventured to take on New Zealand First leader Winston Peters, though her warning to him about the so-called People's Bank would almost certainly have guaranteed his support for the venture.
After the internal party woes and health problems of last year, Mrs Shipley's first speech for the year needed to be good.
It was a cracker.
<i>Cut and thrust:</i> Shipley comes out punching
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