Bruce Bisset says he loves the fact that there's no Team Todd or Team Nikki, just Team National. Photo / File
Bruce Bisset says he loves the fact that there's no Team Todd or Team Nikki, just Team National. Photo / File
What a week, eh? First we learnt National have two types of leaders, the pitiful and the dismal; then we learned Labour distinguishes two types of poor, the deserving and the undeserving.
Funny, but I'm sure that last was a National line from the 1990s. One they actually tried todraw, instead of just forgetting basic justice and telling every poor sod already on the dole they count less because they're not "pandemic impacted".
Yeah, right. Like the price of veges didn't go up for them, as well.
But let's start with the Nats, because it's far more fun. I personally think Todd Muller's great!
I love hearing the same three or four bits of jingoism – like helping the small businesses in Papamoa (hello! It's a big country, Todd) and the fact no plan somehow beats any plan, even a bad one. And this means they're masters of economics.
I especially love the fact there's no Team Todd or Team Nikki, just Team National. Right now I'm sure half their MPs are wishing there was a Team Todd so they could distance themselves from it.
Because, really, what a shower. Surely if you're going to stage a coup you'd at least do some proper prep for it, like having ready answers to obvious press questions.
But no. When even a TV lightweight can have Muller tongue-tied inside two minutes, you know this coup wasn't just a bad idea, it's oblivion on steroids.
Bruce Bisset
Clearly the dysfunction goes way beyond Todd himself. To have your number two jump in on a question directed to your number one in order to say the number three is Maori, when he very clearly isn't, and have your number one not know enough about him to correct it, says more than you need to know even just by looking at the all-white front bench.
Did I mention the MAGA hat? Connecting those two dots paints a very scary picture.
However that's just dandy for us left-leaning folk, because this is the leadership change you have when you have no clue how to win friends and influence people.
What National should be doing is jumping all over Labour's tearing up of the basic social welfare compact by differentiating between unemployed on the basis of before- and after-Covid.
They won't because they'd have to argue that either you don't give the newly-jobless $490 a week, or you have to give everyone on a benefit the same amount – and both those are vote-losers for National.
No way are they about to say the dole's not enough to live on.
But it isn't, as Labour have just tacitly admitted. In fact they've admitted it's barely half as much as you need to survive, since the current single benefit is only $250.
Which doesn't even pay most rents. Forget eating or clothing or heating or god forbid having some fun!
But we can't let the mass of newly-jobless – many of whom are skilled or professional workers – know how bad things really are for our poorest folk, can we? As for the official excuse for this decision, doesn't every unemployed person "need time to adjust or to find other employment"?
So to all you Labour supporters out there, kindly tell your mates in government they've got this badly wrong and to immediately make it right by giving everyone on a benefit the same 12-week relief.
Because the very last thing we want to see now is Labour losing votes through contempt for the poor, and letting National's rent-a-boss crowd back in with Shane Jones on their coattails.
• Bruce Bisset is a freelance writer and poet. Views expressed are the writer's opinion and not the newspaper's.
