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Welcome to Inside Politics. The challenges in health took a back seat this week to law and order.
After a terrible spate of violent crimes over the weekend, it looked as though the Government could have the heat turned on this week, as happened to Labour when ram-raids dominated the news.
Instead, it was an own-goal by the Greens and one that will not be forgotten.
The focus has been on a series of comments by Tamatha Paul suggesting that there should not be more police on the beat and that they make a lot of people feel unsafe.
The trouble is that she is a constituency MP, not a young list MP speaking at an O-week forum. Her Wellington Central electorate is the third wealthiest in the country and one of the most educated.
Yes, it has skewed Labour in most elections since National lost it in 1981, but it is not radical or anti-police. Even Labour leader Chris Hipkins described her comments as “stupid”.
Paul has a majority of 6066 but the provisional changes to boundaries released this week suggest Wellington Central could be in play in 2026, having lost the reddish Mt Cook and Brooklyn suburbs and picked up the bluer Wadestown, Ngaio, and Khandallah ones.
Finance Minister Nicola Willis will likely return to contest Wellington Central, now that Ohāriu has disappeared. It could make sense for the CTU economist, Craig Renney, to go up against Willis for Labour there, leaving Rongotai for frontbench list MP Ayesha Verrall.
Mana MP Barbara Edmonds is certain to contest Kenepuru for Labour and current Ohāriu MP Greg O’Connor may be pointed in the direction of Kāpiti, if he doesn’t retire.
Whatever the final outcome, you can be sure that Paul’s views on the police will be used to clobber both the Greens and Labour, its potential coalition partner.
When most countries have been crawling to the United States in a bid to avoid tariffs – yet to be finalised on April 2 – it seemed an audacious move by Winston Peters in Washington DC last week to again raise the prospect of a free trade agreement with US officials. But, as always, it is not so much what you say as how you say it.
Peters did not do this by tub-thumping but by telling US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that New Zealand was a very, very patient country, having first raised the prospect of a trade agreement in 1870, then again in 1934 and 1937 – not to mention the untold efforts this century.
Ever since hearing Peters repeat those stats to reporters, I’ve been curious about where he got them.
It turns out they came from the prodigious research skills of Brian Lockstone, the late husband of New Zealand’s ambassador to Washington, Rosemary Banks.
Sadly, Lockstone died in a hospital in DC in December 2021, aged 77, after suffering from pneumonia. A former parliamentary journalist and later press secretary, Lockstone honed his research skills as an aviation historian.
His skills were put to good use when he uncovered three pre-war approaches by New Zealand to the US about a trade deal: a letter in 1870 from Premier William Fox to the US Consul in Dunedin, Mr H Driver; an approach by Gordon Coates in 1934 and by Sir Walter Nash in 1937 in their roles as Finance Minister.
Banks returned to New Zealand in 2022, but when her successor, Bede Corry, was appointed Secretary of Foreign Affairs last year, Peters reappointed her to the Washington post, where she is said to be doing a fine job.
Peters gave an unusually frank interview this week on his secret to survival as he approaches 80 next month.
He talked about the diet he has been on since 1980 and his frugal upbringing. But just how unusual is it?
The Parliamentary Library has done some research and, from its records, it can find only six other MPs who have definitely made it past the age of 80: George Grey, who left Parliament in 1895 aged 83; David McDougall, who left in 1938 aged 80; John Cobbe, who left in 1943 aged 84; Bob Semple, who left in 1954 aged 81; Rex Mason, who left in 1966 aged 81; and Walter Nash, who left in 1968 aged 86.
Exclusively from the Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage, Paul Goldsmith, is his latest recommendation on what to watch: the film Tinā, written and directed by Miki Magasiva. Goldsmith loved it. He gives it five stars. “I wept,” he said.
Hipkins being interviewed by Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking yesterday, for the first time in a long time:
Hipkins: Good morning Mike. I’m glad you found my number again.
Hosking: No, we never lost your number Chris. Just didn’t wanna ring it. You know how it goes.
Hipkins [laughing]: It’s a brutal business, Mike.
Hosking [laughing]: It’s a tough business, Chris.
The Prime Minister of which Pacific country visited the Beehive this week? (Answer below.)
No contest. Paul for being remarkably out of touch with her constituents in questioning the value of police walking the beat. It may be time to knock on a few doors in Karori, Tamatha.
Goes to Labour’s finance spokeswoman Edmonds who, alone, defended Treasury after Peters said on Sunday that the Pre-Election Fiscal Update (Prefu) was a “litany of lies”.
He wrongly attributed Prefu to Labour politicians – as an opening of the books, it is entirely the work of the Treasury. Edmonds said his comments were unfair. Willis turned the screw, saying she seldom had cause to disagree with Peters.
Sentencing reforms: Labour is reserving its judgment on the Government’s sentencing reforms that include capping the discounts judges can apply at sentencing.
Electorate boundaries: Major changes are being proposed to electorates in the lower North Island, resulting in the abolition of one seat.
Jackson profile: “We want to take people with us” – Willie Jackson talks about his big new job in Labour and his policy mission for the next 18 months.
OPINION – Peters speech: Winston Peters mentioned Labour 30 times in his state of the nation Speech on Sunday more than he mentioned NZ First, writes Thomas Coughlan – more than he mentioned NZ First, writes Thomas Coughlan.
Quiz answer: James Marape, PM of Papua New Guinea
For more political news and views, listen to On the Tiles, the Herald’s politics podcast.
The Government considered a 5 percentage point cut to the corporate tax rate.