I know officially it is too late for me to throw my name into the hat for the leadership of the Labour Party, but I figure that at some stage in their arcane selection process someone in a position of power will look at the list of candidates and go "really, this is the best we've got?" And once this thought threshold is crossed, it is surely only a matter of time before they go, "People, we need to think outside the square here," and outside the square is the place where I live and do my best work.
Another thing working in my favour when it comes to me getting the nod to be the front man in the Labour firing line, taking on the benevolent Keysian dictatorship, is that when it comes to Labour thinking outside the square they don't have to go very far because their square is quite small and getting smaller with every election. In fact, if they continue to go the way they're going, and the square keeps shrinking, Labour could become the first political party to split the atom.
Luckily for me, even though the square is tiny and also shrinking it is full; of a vacuum, a leadership vacuum. Given the chance, I can be the vacuum cleaner that sucks up that vacuum and fills the squares with fresh ideas; ideas from outside the square where there is fresh air for the ideas to flourish and grow, which is something that cannot happen within a vacuum-filled square.
One of the great points of difference Labour has over National is that they come across as the party who actually cares about actual people, ahead of caring about profits and looking after your mates. If anything, Labour seems to care too much about actual people and not enough about being an actual political party.
My suggestion, as leader-in-waiting, is that Labour needs to build on this caring reputation by having all their MPs spend the next three years not in Parliament, in a futile attempt to be the Parliamentary Opposition, but actually out in the community, caring about people. Leave the pompous oppositional speechifying to people like Winston, who love having a soapbox from which to pontificate. Instead of spouting meaningless rhetoric at a bunch of people in blue ties who never listen anyway, Labour's MPs should spend their days working in animal shelters or delivering meals on wheels or even just running little B'n'Bs where the hosts are really nice people. New Zealanders love people who are nice, possibly even enough to vote for them.
