Simon Bridges in his parliamentary office in 2019. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Simon Bridges in his parliamentary office in 2019. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Opinion
As we say goodbye to 2020 and welcome in 2021, it's a good time to catch up on the very best of the Herald columnists we enjoyed reading over the last 12 months. From politics to sport, from business to entertainment and lifestyle, these are the voices and views ouraudience loved the most. Today it's the top three from Audrey Young.
For Simon Bridges, self-belief and rat-cunning weren't enough
Simon Bridges was not a popular leader. Not at the end, and not at the start.
Even when he won a resounding victory against some serious high-flyers in the National Party, including Steven Joyce and Amy Adams, he wasn't given much credit for the achievement.
So why did he get it in the first place and why did he fail in the end, losing a challenge from Todd Muller?
Bridges has always been ambitious, confident and not one to express a jot of self-doubt. And he has been a fighter to the end. It has been his most enduring quality, even if he has not always known there is a time not to fight.
Selecting Todd Muller as the new National Party leader is almost as big a gamble by the caucus as keeping Simon Bridges would have been.
His first challenge will be to pretend the party is unified.
Pretending wont be easy because he is essentially a decent, honest guy without much political guile.
The first few days of his leadership will be crucial, both internally and publicly.
Muller's performance needs to be assured and authentic. The exposure he gets in the next week is likely to be the most intense he will ever get.
One thing that will be puzzling many people is why Collins was not running for the leadership contest this time.
The fact her previous forays have been so unsuccessful meant she has got to a point at which she is not going to enter another contest she is not assured of winning.
She does not want to be branded a perpetual loser.
Todd Muller at a National Party supporters meeting in June. Photo / Alan Gibson
National's failures on Covid patient leak from top to bottom
The National Party has suffered a massive breach of sound judgment from top to bottom.
MP Hamish Walker's confession to being the person who sent the names of Covid-19 patients to media outlets was bad enough — but his apology has reinforced his shocking judgment.
It is an apology for an apology. It smacks of self-righteous post-fact justification, and downright deception.
