As soon as Steven Joyce announced the Government will be looking into the travel subsidies currently enjoyed by Gold Card carrying superannuitants, you could hear the coffin creak open.
If ever Winston Peters has been offered a lifeline, this is it.
After the last election, where the desperate shenanigans and
weasel words became obvious to even the most loyal of Winston's fans, the New Zealand First party failed to win any seats nor did it win enough votes to get its members back into Parliament. Winston retired, hurt.
But you can't keep a good ol' boy down. Recently, he's been back on the hustings, giving the punters the same tried and true messages that have worked for him and his party so many times before.
In a rousing speech at the Greymouth RSA, Peters banged on about the tyranny of overseas ownership of New Zealand assets, too many migrants - in particular, too many immigrant taxi drivers - and tax changes leaving pensioners worse off while the wealthy line their pockets.
It's like hearing John Rowles reprising Cheryl Moana Marie for the millionth time.
Now, with the Transport Minister warning direly the free ferry trips to Waiheke and the freebie train trips to enjoy the wine trail in the Wairarapa may be under threat, Peters will be poised to pounce.
I say let the oldies keep their free trips - for most of their working lives they had high taxes, precious little in the way of luxuries and years and years of Muldoonism.
Also, it won't give Winston Peters any traction, and that's important to me.
