Q + A – April 28, 2013

PANEL DISCUSSIONS

Hosted by SUSAN WOOD

In response to SHANE JONES interview

SUSAN
Good morning to the panel. Political scientist Jon Johansson from Victoria a very good morning to you. Former National Party president Michelle Boag, and Mana Party – what are you? President? Vice-president – I was about to promote you, put you up a pay grade, as Shane Jones would say – and of course activist John Minto. Michelle, let me bring it to you first. Very interesting interview, I thought, with Shane Jones. “Finally found something I can agree with the Greens on” was the quote I wrote out of it. How are they going to work together, if they are elected next time around, with a guy like that there?

MICHELLE
Look, that was a very polished performance, and you can see why Shane Jones was talked about as a potential leader. He’s not known for having the greatest work ethic in the caucus, but he’s very intelligent, he’s very smart, and that was a very polished performance. He clearly is swallowing a dead rat, but he’s doing so in the interests of the party and he’s doing so because he see that it’s the only way that he’s going to progress as part of a team. There's several ironies. For him to be talking about the merchant banking community as being the ones who are the most concerned – you know, there are two things. First of all, the Labour government, the last Labour government was the direct beneficiary of all these super-profits that they’re talking about. They weren’t super-profits. But they are the ones that took the most out of those companies, because they were government-owned. Secondly, there are now nearly two million New Zealanders in Kiwisaver. If you're in Kiwisaver, you are a shareholder of these companies. That’s the way it happens. Where do you think Kiwisaver puts its money? It doesn’t put it in the bank. It puts it on the capital markets. So in destroying wealth the way they have in the last week – somewhere between $500 million and $700 million – they’re taking that off two million New Zealanders. So they’re completely ignoring all that, very conveniently, but there are some real ironies here.

SUSAN
John Minto, an unintended consequence. Kiwisaver, Cullen Fund – they will be invested in things like Contact Energy and others of those, and wealth has been eroded through this.

JOHN
Well, you know, I think that the impact on Kiwisaver for an individual New Zealander would be nothing, absolutely nothing, compared to what they’re going to save with this policy. And I think that National has handled this really badly. They’ve reacted really badly and I think when Labour and the Greens made that announcement, I think there was almost a collective sigh right across the country. Because we’ve had this for 15 years – we’ve been told the market will deliver better prices, more efficiency. We’ve been told again and again and again, and ppl just open their power bill every month and think “oh my god”, so I think the public have moved on, and I think this is a definite win for Labour and the Greens.

SUSAN
The politics in the last week – how has this played out from your view, Jon?

JON
John Armstrong nailed it, I thought, when he said the exponential power of two. That is the real import of the announcement from a political perspective is that for the first time, really, you can see what the alternative government is. That’s why part of the furious, hysterical reaction to this policy is all predicated on this premise – that, you know, for the first time voters can see this is actually what our alternative is. And the concern for National, and I think one of the reasons why National has stayed up in the polls is because the idea of the opposition has been so diffuse: a sort of struggling Labour and all these other parties – the Green and what have you. Now you see what the alternative government is.

SUSAN
But John Minto—

JON
And Shane actually – that was a very very disciplined, powerful reinforcement of that point in that interview today.

SUSAN
But underlying that, and I think Michelle made a point, Jon, he was swallowing dead rats, John Minto. There is a lot of stuff that he does not agree with with the Greens. Back to the quote: “I finally found something I can agree with on the Greens.” How are they going to work together in real terms?

JON
Well, we’ve just seen.

JOHN
Oh, absolutely. I mean, how do National and ACT work together? How does the Maori Party work with National? I mean—

JON
But it is a different situation, and I grant you that. Because, like, you know, and that’s actually why they need to be doing things like they’ve done this week more of, because what different from, say, 1999 when Labour came in with the Alliance or the situation that John Key has found himself in with ACT and United is that Labour is not— Remember that Labour starts the next election day 20 points behind National from 2011. So it is going to be a situation where Labour plus the Greens are going to potentially get more seats and votes than National. But it is a different situation. Labour is not going to be in those command heights that National is going to be in. So there is more need for them to frame to the electorate that they can work together collaboratively.

SUSAN
Let me bring Michelle in here. I mean, a lot of New Zealand now, though, is being fought on this middle ground. We saw Helen Clark take the middle ground. We’ve seen John Key effectively take the middle ground. With Labour and the left, is that going to work in your view?

MICHELLE
What I think is interesting in this whole thing is that after the announcement, when Shearer was involved, we haven’t seen Shearer.

JON
He’s overseas.

MICHELLE
Shearer hasn’t been part of it. Well, that’s not a good time to go overseas when you announce a major policy and then off you go, leaving in charge David Parker, who in 2006 said this policy wouldn’t work. So what's happened that finally it can work? I tell you what's happened—

JON
He would say he’s grown. He’s learnt from past experience.

MICHELLE
Oh, what has happened—

JON
We are entitled to learn, are we not?

MICHELLE
Let me tell you what's happened, Jon. What has happened is they’ve finally realised that the only way that they are going to get into government is to give ground to the Greens, and I think that’s very scary for New Zealanders, and it’s very easy to say—

JON
No.

MICHELLE
It’s very easy to say, “Oh, we’re going to save you this much money.” And all that talk about industries investing with cheaper power – if you look at the graphs that David Parker showed, the cost of commercial power has gone down over that long period, not up. So why is it—?

SUSAN
This is a fact, John Minto, because actually part of the reason for domestic power going up so much is that we are now on a more even keel in terms of business. Business have been subsidising domestic power.

JOHN
Well, no, we’ve got— I think householders are now paying three times the amount that industry is, and no New Zealander thinks that’s fair. Look, I think the public have moved on, but I think the danger for Labour here is that they see this as their show pony for the election and they kind of coast along—

SUSAN
It’s a long way away.

JOHN
I know. And they coast along on it. I think that Labour needs to address the market failure across the board in so many different areas, and if they can develop policies along those lines, then they’ll really enhance what John was saying before.

SUSAN
Well, we did see— Let me bring in this point here, because he did mention that, you know, light-handed regulation – been in favour of it, now maybe not so much. He referenced Pike River. Do you think we’re seeing a shift here in terms of the light-handed regulation might be something that Labour’s got to move away from?

JON
The problem is always, and you actually saw this in this bizarre— I mean, the financial markets this week, the way they behaved after the red-green announcement were sort of like idiot villagers yelling out, “Witch! Witch! Witch!” I mean, the self-interest was just too palpable, and in fact if we’re talking economic sabotage, why the government didn’t actually just dampen down this from the get-go, you could see just how badly they were caught on the hop with this.

SUSAN
But do you think – back to that question – lighter-handed regulation is going to be something else we’re going to be seeing rolled over from Labour?

JON
Well, if Pike River doesn’t remind the country—

SUSAN
Very different to electricity, thought.

JON
No, no, but it’s the abandonment of—

MICHELLE
It wasn’t the abandonment. Come on, Pike River was all about a company that actually wasn’t doing its job properly.

JON
Oh, come on!

JOHN
No, no, no, no, no, no.

MICHELLE
But, look, this isn’t about—

JON
You can’t remove the country’s inspectors, Michelle.

SUSAN
Let Michelle talk.

MICHELLE
This isn’t about Pike River. What this is about, and it’s interesting that Grant Robertson had to come out and reassure people that they weren’t going to do this with any other policy, and yet what you guys are saying is that’s exactly what they’ll be doing…

JON
No, no, no, no.

MICHELLE
…pushed by the Greens.

JON
I’m not saying that at all, Michelle.

MICHELLE
That’s where the Greens are going to go. They want to put a stake in the ground and control the market.

JON
This is the same Green Party who’s led by a finance spokesman whose most speeches are about fiscal rectitude.

JOHN
You know, I think the public’s moved on past this debate. The public can see Pike River. They can see the complete lack of affordable housing in Auckland and around the country. They can see market failure staring them in the face.

SUSAN
So you think that a left wing will look at more heavy regulation?

JOHN
Yeah, they will, definitely.

JON
A centre-left government. I mean, Steven Joyce, if his rhetoric is to be believed, should, every time he looks in the mirror when he has a shave in the morning, go, “Filthy Communist!” Because he’s presiding over Kiwirail.

SUSAN
Last word, Michelle.

JON
He’s presiding over Working for Families.

SUSAN
Quick last word, Michelle.

MICHELLE
Look, I think here that what we’ve got – a situation where it’s very easy to say, “We’re going to save you this much money.” There is no proof, there is no identification of what it’s going to cost the country, of how in fact it’s going to be done. I’ll be very surprised if they can make it work. What it does indicate is that the Greens are wagging Labour’s tail.

(laughter)

SUSAN Thank you, panel. We will leave it there.

*

In response to TE URUROA FLAVELL and DAVID ROUND interview

SUSAN
Now, John Minto, a good discussion to be having around how our constitution— You know, if we don’t have a written one, should we have one? Or sort of heading for an apartheid state, according to David Round, perhaps?

JOHN
Well, you know, I think this is scaremongering on the part of David Round, and it seems that whenever we try and have these conversations in New Zealand, we end up with normally politicians taking it over, and we end up with a debate that goes nowhere, and I think this will end up going nowhere. But I just want to say this: that there is one really interesting thing happening as part of this constitutional review, and I think it’s the most coherent and authentic thing that’s happening, and that’s Moana Jackson going around with a group that had at least 160 meetings at marae—

JON
This is the alternative—?

JOHN
Yeah, one of the— Well, there's several groups that are doing this, but this one that is really definitely grassroots, and if you look at the best developments of constitutions overseas, they involve a grassroots discussion – real people in their homes and their workplaces and at their marae. We don’t have that. We have that in Maoridom. We don’t have it in the Pakeha world. The Pakeha world or the tauiwi world – people just don’t know what's going on and we will end up with very little feedback, and the feedback we do get will end up being battered around by politicians.

SUSAN
And, Jon, they’ll write a report and it will go in a bottom drawer somewhere, one presumes.

JON
Well, if you look back right from the get-go, Prime Minister Key has not had a lot of personal flesh in this. You know, it was his deputy along with Pita Sharples that, you know, are the responsible ministers for this. And, you know, Prime Minister Key is also very wedded to the monarchy, and the fact that republicanism, which has overwhelming support amongst younger New Zealanders, didn’t even make it into the terms of reference.

SUSAN
Not even on the table.

JON
So National’s gone in at this, and I know that there were a lot of upheavals in the National caucus, even getting to agreeing on the terms of reference. And they would like to come out of this process and try and sell us a four-year term, right? And I think Maori’s hopes to elevate the status of the Treaty, however strong that is, is not going to happen as a result of this particular mechanism. I think what we’ll end up with is actually a very good resource to help teach New Zealanders where their country has come from.

SUSAN
A history document. A history book.

JON
Yeah, and the issues about what's around. But, I mean, you just have to think about our demographics and the way our demographics are just massively changing. And if there's one metaphor I’d have for this in relation to Maori and Pakeha, we all know that that is the heart of our nation, right. But we also know that the blood that’s now coursing through our veins is much richer, varied and diverse, and so the real trick for us as a nation is how do we move from this sort of bicultural fixation to the next phase of our history which is an embrace of all of us? And you see Round approaching it from a very narrow and chasing phantom menaces and what have you sort of approach. And Te Ururoa Flavell represents that side for Maori. But I think most of us, and this is where I think it does fall down is that most of us don’t have that opportunity of being able to talk about it.

SUSAN
Michelle, when you don’t have a Pacific voice, you don’t have a particularly Asian voice out there speaking, how do you have something that actually talks about our going forwards?

MICHELLE
Indeed, and I’m in favour of us having the debate, absolutely. I think, however, it’s worth remembering that the fact that we don’t have a written constitution hasn’t prevented the principles of the Treaty being enshrined in legislation where governments have considered it appropriate. My sort of feeling about this is that for the first sort of 120, 130 years after the signing of the Treaty, governments didn’t do a very good job of respecting the Treaty. In the 50 or 60 years since then, we’ve had successive governments doing their best to make sure that the spirit of the Treaty was acknowledged, and we’ve seen settlements—

JON
And this government has done extraordinarily well.

MICHELLE
Exactly. Chris Findlayson has done an amazing job in getting through as many settlements as he can. But there will come a time when we do have to move on. I think it’s highly appropriate to have the discussion. People shouldn’t be afraid of the discussion, and the more that they take very narrow viewpoints on it, the less helpful it will be.

SUSAN
The fear, though, John Minto, that if we were to have a written constitution – and that’s by no means a given – but if we were and the Treaty were entrenched in that, everything would have to filter through that Treaty prism.

JOHN
Well, I think, you know, any constitution has that same effect, doesn’t it? I mean, the American constitution, any country. For hundreds of years, you know, all legislation gets filtered through there. And what's the problem with that?

SUSAN
But is that—?

JOHN
I think the Treaty—

JON
Well, I see a problem with it, John, and that is that because of the different translations, and irrespective of international law here, because this is a domestic political issue. You don’t want to import ambiguity into higher law.

JOHN
No, no, I don’t think there is ambiguity.

JON
You’d be foolish to do that. So I agree that in a formal written constitution, you must be able to— Maori must not lose any rights they currently possess in a new written constitution. That partnership aspect of it and, you know, the natural to and fro that comes issue by issue – water, the Y262 claim, all the rest of it. They will keep on happening, but there are ways that you could organise a written constitution that incorporates the Treaty but doesn’t define the written constitution solely in terms of that treaty. That would be the trick.

JOHN
I think people have— Again, I think the public have moved on. I think the public do accept that the Treaty is the founding document of New Zealand, and it gives—

JON
A founding document, not the.

JOHN
No, I think it is the.

JON
No, because at the very same time—

SUSAN
The or a, Michelle?

MICHELLE
Well, uh…

JON
Magna Carta.

MICHELLE
Yes, it is— In respect of New Zealand, it is the only document that we have of a written nature, but I agree with John – it’s very difficult to interpret modern law through a document that was written when none of what happens today was ever envisaged in terms of—

SUSAN
And we can’t agree on the Maori or English version.

MICHELLE
…spectrum and technology, etc.

JOHN
Oh, no, I don’t think that’s— I think that’s a red herring.

MICHELLE
It’s not a red herring.

JOHN
The thing is the Maori version— Sorry, Michelle, I was referring to this… The Maori version is the one that was signed. That’s what the chiefs understood, and they signed it. And there's no dispute about what that says.

SUSAN
Alright, final quick question. Should we even have a written constitution?

JON
I believe we should. I didn’t say it very well last time I was on this show, but when the executive is continually giving itself a clean bill of health, I would love a formal written constitution – and this is in terms of the GSCB stuff—

SUSAN
GCSB.

JON
GCSB. I would love a written constitution that absolutely made clear where the demarcations are and provided better checks and balances than we have in our unwritten constitution.

SUSAN
Yes. Michelle.

MICHELLE
I don’t think we need it. I think the fact that we are still regarded as a corruption-free nation with heaps of freedom with a free press with all the freedoms in the world that people could possibly want means you don’t have to have a written constitution to guarantee that.

SUSAN
Thank you, panel.

© Scoop Media