Geoffrey Miller

New Zealand geopolitical analyst & Arabic/Russian learner

Tagged: 3 News

Politics

Ultimus inter pares – part I

Minister of Local Government Minister of Regulatory Reform Associate Minister of Commerce + Minister of Consumer Affairs Associate Minister of Defence Associate Minister of Education + Reviews, committees, discussions, aims, aspirations, considerations, concepts, Commissions, working groups, taskforces, briefings – Roger Douglas = A great deal for the National Party. Over the past week ACT has been successfully cornered by a cunning John Key. Overtly, Key has told New Zealand that the reason he wanted to draw in the Maori Party and United Future – even though their participation is technically unnecessary – is to build an “inclusive” government. But the...

Politics

Emissions Trading Scheme

One of ACT’s centrepiece policies of this election pledges to repeal the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). As I understand it, the ETS will require businesses to purchase “credits” for carbon they wish to emit from other companies which have a surplus (e.g. foresters). There is an official diagram which explains this further. The ETS enjoys support from both Labour and National. But ACT opposes it. My concern here is not so much the workings of the ETS, but the way ACT has promoted its opposition to it. There is no question that the party sees it as a key policy...

Politics

Hide the stuntman

A supporter of most ACT policies was kind enough to send me some photos of the party’s weekend campaign event. Some refreshing honesty here: even the supporter described it as a “stunt”. As the photo shows, it involved putting up 77 cardboard coffins to represent victims of violent crime who would have been “saved” had ACT’s crime policy been in place. Visual representations like this are designed for television and are not a stupid idea by any means. There was talk at ACT’s conference in March of carrying out similar exercises for economic matters. The obvious one would be to...

Politics

TV debates: MMP, not FPP

News that Helen Clark and John Key are refusing to debate each other with other party leaders has understandably been received with anger by Rodney Hide. Television debates are a major platform for small party leaders to put forward their case to voters. Excluding leaders other than from National or Labour devalues votes given to small parties and only encourages the mistaken view that New Zealand has a presidential system, rather than a proportional, MMP environment. Hide performs well in debates and will be annoyed that he will be robbed of a potential opportunity to swing voters from National in...

Politics

Poll results offer glimmer of hope?

ACT has managed to double its poll results, according to the latest surveys by TVNZ and TV3 out on Sunday. ACT had been down at around 0.3-0.4% in the One News-Colmar Brunton Poll, but had increased that to 1.2% according to Sunday’s figures. On TV3, the party was at 1%, up from 0.5% in the last poll. I think TV3 may round its figures to the nearest whole or half percentage point, so the actual result may have been slightly higher (or lower) than 1%. These results may be no more than a statistical blip, but could it be the...

Politics

Attacks on ACT from left and right – an Easter bonus for the party?

ACT can be well satisfied with itself this Easter, having caused not one but two attacks on it before the break. To me it sounds like a return to the old days, when ACT caused loathing from both the left and the so-called centre right. During the 1999 election campaign, Bill English called ACT’s policies “unrealistic”. On Thursday he was forced to do much the same, while John Key was scrambling to find a coherent answer to the idea of Douglas becoming a Cabinet minister. The kerfuffle started when Douglas outlined policies he wants to implement should he get the...

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