OPINION:
The Weekend Herald’s Chris v Chris column compares the weeks that each Chris has had – National Party leader Christopher Luxon and Prime Minister and Labour leader Chris Hipkins.
This week started off with a bang with two polls which delivered good news to Hipkins: his start had managed to push Labour slightly ahead of National again in the polls, and he debuted slightly ahead of Luxon as preferred PM.
Otherwise it was a battle of the two catch-phrases: Bread and Butter vs Getting Things Done.
The big showdown on that front was the Auckland floods. This was going to be harder for the Luxon Chris than the Hipkins, partly because leaders of the Opposition always struggle to be heard in a crisis.
Hipkins could hurl money toward the relief effort and also announce he was extending the fuel tax cuts while Luxon could not offer any fruits.
So he had to settle for the helping-out-in-the-floods social media posts that MPs seem to think are as critical a part of the endeavour as actually helping out is.
Of course, like justice, helping out in a flood not only has to be done it has to be seen to be done.
So the Chrises were both diligently posting photos of themselves on their socials or ensuring the media cameras turned up.
(This is not to detract from the efforts of many MPs whose efforts have been significant and sometimes quiet in the floods – from clean-ups, directing people toward help, delivering food, and in East Coast Bays MP Erica Stanford’s case, helping ensure parking tickets issued to flood-abandoned cars were revoked).
Luxon had the advantage, due to living in Auckland and not having much else to do other than helping out in the floods and being seen to be doing so.
Hipkins had Cabinet, a reshuffle, staff to employ and money to find to be able to announce he was extending the fuel tax subsidy as his first cost of living measure.
He did get up for a couple of days on Wednesday and Thursday. We had Hipkins helping fill a food box – far too slowly to be considered a valuable cog in the production line. He was at least literally delivering on his new catchphrase that he would focus on the bread and butter.
Luxon also had a catchphrase to live up to, which is that he will “get things done”. This put a bit more pressure on him when it came to the helping out ops. So we had footage of him rolling up and carting sodden carpets, and carrying a box of Huggies for an emergency centre.
There was not nearly as much footage of him doing things as there was of him saying he would get things done. It’s starting to sound eerily like Wayne Brown’s catchphrase that he would Fix Auckland.
From the AM Show, when Luxon was asked why people didn’t trust him as much as Hipkins: “People can trust me to put together a government that will get things done. I’m used to getting things done. I’m a guy who cares deeply about people who wants to get things done, through, with and for people. That is my background.”
It remains unclear exactly what he would get done.
Luxon ceded the week to Hipkins as the Chris for the Week - Hipkins at least didn’t bore us by repeating the same phrase over and over and over. Better luck next week, Chris.