NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Politics

Phil Quin: Jump to left puts Labour on rocky road

By Phil Quin
NZ Herald·
3 Jun, 2014 05:00 PM3 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

David Cunliffe. Photo / APN

David Cunliffe. Photo / APN

Opinion

Some Labour Party cheerleaders have convinced themselves they can capture the Treasury benches without winning an election. They're wrong.

They also seem to think Labour can afford to play nice with the Greens, play wordless footsies with Internet Mana, and avoid direct combat with National over the centre ground. Wrong, and wrong again.

This theory of September's election relies on the fantastical notion that a million-strong army of erstwhile non-voters (and, presumably, opinion poll non-responders) are set to storm the nation's polling booths once Labour has lurched exactly far enough left.

Such self-serving delusions are reminiscent of the American right's insistence prior to the 2012 elections that polls pointing to Obama's re-election were "skewed" against Republicans and Mitt Romney was heading for a landslide win.

Utterly convinced, as one pundit wrote, that voters "will send Obama into the history books as an undisputed calamity for America", even otherwise sensible conservatives latched on to the idea that older whites were under-sampled in pre-election surveys despite solid evidence that such voters are typically over-represented.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Confirmation bias - that most human tendency to believe whatever reinforces our existing beliefs - holds powerful sway, and especially among political partisans.

Comforting falsehoods keep supporters buoyed and dull the pain of imminent defeat, but they shouldn't take the place of a strategy.

The real world electoral equation in New Zealand remains unchanged from a century ago: hold your turf and plunder the middle.

In the First Past the Post era, the "middle" took the easily recognisable form of places like Gisborne, Horowhenua and Hamiltons East and West.

Labour had to compete in provincial and suburban marginal seats because forming a government wasn't possible in urban strongholds alone.

Discover more

New Zealand

Election gimmicks don't work

28 May 07:40 PM
New Zealand

Test trial proves to be a life-saver

29 May 05:00 PM
Opinion

John Roughan: Oldies after the youth vote

30 May 08:44 PM
New Zealand|politics

Labour leaders' secret files

01 Jun 02:30 AM

Some in the party took MMP as a cue to abandon marginal seat campaigning in favour of the party vote, diminishing Labour's geographic as well as demographic reach.

Inevitably, the party's standing took a hit in former battlegrounds: Labour, which topped the party vote in Hamilton West in 2005, won just 29 per cent last time.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Ironically for a party preoccupied with meeting diversity quotas, Labour's highly centralised approach has failed to produce a caucus notable for its dynamism or breadth of experience.

Would the recent proposal to ban trucks from fast lanes, for example, pass muster in a caucus with an assertive regional voice? It's highly doubtful.

Conversely, a policy agenda tilted towards regional voters risks smacking of opportunism this late in the electoral cycle, compounding the authenticity problem some perceive with Labour's leadership. Labour's posturing on immigration will backfire for that reason.

Cunliffe, Shearer, Parker or otherwise, no David can match Key's Goliath without competing across the spectrum: stemming the flow of millennial voters to the Greens; peeling swing voters off National in the regions and outer suburbs; and maximising so-called base voters in Labour's heartland.

The fear that such approaches are mutually exclusive - that appealing to the centre will invariably alienate the left and vice versa - reflects a deficiency of policy imagination and political confidence in roughly equal measure.

Labour is losing, and losing badly. And it's doing so for deep, structural reasons.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The party is too small, too monotonous, too narrowly focused.

A good start would be to revisit the fallacy that Labour gets to define the political terrain within which it competes. Hypothetical best-case scenarios built on complex MMP algorithms and phantom voter battalions are no match for a 20-point poll lead.

Phil Quin is a former adviser for the NZ and Australia labour parties and a strategic communications consultant.

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Politics

Premium
OpinionAudrey Young

Audrey Young: Bishop puts boot into councils as rates table reveals biggest hikes

Politics

'It’s inevitable': David Letele teases move into politics

Politics

Bill banning pay gag orders for workers likely to pass into law


Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Politics

Premium
Premium
Audrey Young: Bishop puts boot into councils as rates table reveals biggest hikes
Audrey Young
OpinionAudrey Young

Audrey Young: Bishop puts boot into councils as rates table reveals biggest hikes

OPINION: It's been the week for bashing local government – although not without cause.

17 Jul 12:42 AM
'It’s inevitable': David Letele teases move into politics
Politics

'It’s inevitable': David Letele teases move into politics

16 Jul 10:30 PM
Bill banning pay gag orders for workers likely to pass into law
Politics

Bill banning pay gag orders for workers likely to pass into law

16 Jul 08:04 PM


Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

06 Jul 09:47 PM
NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP