Editorial: United must wonder about future

Opinion

It is difficult to see this weekend's United Future annual meeting being other than a subdued occasion. The party is ailing in the polls, attracting a level of support that was typically its lot before a surprisingly strong showing at the last general election. Pearls that were anticipated to flow the party's way have turned to swine. In sum, a strategy designed to stop United Future sharing the fate of junior coalition partners in the first two MMP governments has shown little sign of bearing fruit.

That strategy involved the party showing, for a start, that it could be a stabilising influence. Duly, a disparate group of eight MPs has stuck together, ensuring there would be no repeat of the disintegrations that afflicted New Zealand First and then the Alliance. Those parties succumbed to pressure when opinion polls punished their obeisance. United Future's ploy to negate this has involved an increasingly more vigorous pursuit of its own policies. Its ambition has been to stamp its own identity.

Not everything has gone to plan. Nothing exemplifies the party's woes so much as how its success in persuading the Finance Minister to link tax bracket thresholds to inflation became lost in translation. In his Budget speech, Michael Cullen, keen to acknowledge United Future as the Labour Party's preferred source of support, credited the junior party for the initiative. Yet any benefit that might have flowed was swiftly subsumed by the Government's failure to deliver more generous tax tidings.

The misfires do not stop there. United Future's flagship policy - and its major price for agreeing to back Labour on all crucial votes - was a Families Commission. This was created in late 2003. It has been noteworthy, however, only for the departure of its chief executive after five months and a subsequent apology to the Social Development Minister for approving a confidential payout.

United Future's leader, Peter Dunne, claims his party has also taken radical edges off some Labour proposals, influenced the likes of transport legislation and secured stronger victims' rights laws. But it has been pointedly unsuccessful in diluting some policies that angered its Christian wing - and many potential supporters. In particular, it railed in vain against civil union and prostitution reform legislation. This throws a damper over any claim it may make to be an effective advocate for traditional social values focused on the family.

All is not necessarily lost, however. United Future will again go into the election as a party advocating commonsense solutions. This approach, enunciated by Mr Dunne during the 2002 televised leaders' debate, galvanised support. It is possible also that the party will again profit from being viewed as a strong option by voters who do not want to see more radical parties having too strong an influence on government - the sort of electors who last time decided that the Greens should not have too great a say in policy and who thought Labour needed to be constrained by a party of moderate persuasion.

Nevertheless, delegates at this weekend's conference will be occupied most immediately by the likes of a Herald on Sunday-Digipoll survey taken early this month which showed United Future enjoying 0.9 per cent support. That suggests a party depending for its survival on Mr Dunne's grip on Ohariu-Belmont. It also hints at little kudos for a stabilising influence that, at the very least, has warded off any immediate rethink of MMP.

If such is the case, Labour will be particularly disappointed. Its arrangement with United Future has been more than satisfactory and it would like this to blossom, preferably free of other influences, after the election. United Future, for its part, has diligently sought to avoid the minority-partner mistakes of the first two MMP governments. Now, however, remaining at the centre of things appears to hinge on voters wanting continuity and predictability.