Editorial: Lessons here from overseas poll results

It is hard to draw general lessons from politics in different countries. Photo / AP

Editorial

Britain's election a week ago can be put in the column with its Brexit referendum and the United States presidential election as symptoms of unrest in Western democracies.

The recent French elections too, though they have gone in the polar opposite direction philosophically, are a resounding vote against the status quo.

Emmanuel Macron represents everything the voters for Brexit and Donald Trump rejected but he won the presidency from outside France's mainstream parties last month and his own young party did so well in the first round of National Assembly elections last weekend that it looks set for a comfortable majority of seats after the run-offs on Sunday.

It is hard to draw general lessons from politics in different countries.

English voters have confused the pundits twice, first by voting to leave the European Union, now by marking down a Prime Minister who took their Brexit verdict to heart and offered a hard-headed approach to negotiations in Brussels.

But the terms Britain seeks hardly featured in the snap election by all accounts. The campaign turned instead on the performances of the main party leaders.

Theresa May was less impressive than she has been in Parliament, Jeremy Corbyn was more impressive. May was described as "robotic", Corbyn came across as genuine.

His views may be well to the left of most of his Labour colleagues but Corbyn was clearly not a creature of compromise, unlike the Conservative's leader who watered down a proposal to asset test aged care as soon as it came under attack.

If New Zealand's political leaders are trying to discern a pattern in recent election results as they prepare for their own contest in September, they ought to read the commentary on the British election we published on Tuesday, by a centre-left New Zealander, Josie Pagani.

She suggests that Corbyn, unlike Hillary Clinton but in common with Bernie Sanders and perhaps Trump, conveyed the message that, "I hold my views so sincerely that I am prepared to go down to defeat if you don't agree."

Of course many of Corbyn's policies did not require sincerity so much as money. He seemed to think government is simply a matter of ladling lots of money onto services he believed to be "underfunded".

But there is no denying his sincerity, just as there was no doubt Sanders and indeed Trump, genuinely believed everything they said to Americans last year. At least, Trump believed it when he said it.

When it was so outrageous he had to backtrack next day, his followers forgave him. They were often heard to say, "he says what he believes" and, "tells it like it is".

Leaders with government experience, like Clinton, May and those of established parties in France, seem to be distrusted by many voters because voters know these leaders are mindful of all the considerations a government has to balance.

When experienced leaders promise the earth they are not believed. They do better when they offer realism and sound judgment, and stand by unpopular but necessary decisions.

They, too, have to show they are willing to face defeat if voters do not agree.