John Armstrong: Peters' pre-nup agreement

While we await final confirmation of their betrothal, what chance of the forced marriage between Labour and Winston Peters lasting?

The short answer is longer than Peters' track record in Government might suggest. That makes dismal reading - and is the biggest incentive for him to make things work this time.

Paradoxically, the survival rating of a Labour-led minority coalition with Peters diminishes if he does accept the responsibility of a ministerial post.

That could be a strategic mistake. There will have been strenuous urgings from within NZ First for him to decline Helen Clark's offer. The fear is the party's identity will fall under Labour's shadow and is better preserved by remaining outside Government, even though NZ First will be backing Labour on confidence motions.

Moreover, Peters is the quintessential Opposition politician. He is at his brilliant best in that role. A job in Clark's ministry - even a role outside the Cabinet - would bind him to the doctrine of collective ministerial responsibility.

Being a member of the Government would dramatically curtail his freedom to criticise it. You can already hear the Opposition cries of "lapdog" and "poodle". A muzzled Peters is an unhappy Peters. And history shows that is when things turn to custard.

But the odds overall on Labour and Peters sticking together for three years must rate better than those of the ill-fated National-NZ First coalition of the 1990s, which was doomed from the start.

Jim Bolger tried to put a gloss on that marriage of inconvenience by becoming best mates with someone who had caused him considerable aggravation.

That stoked resentment within National, already smarting from having to swallow most of Peters' policy wish-list.

That kowtowing to Peters became the lever for ejecting Bolger as leader. The resentment destabilised the coalition. As did Peters' bitterness towards Jenny Shipley at Bolger's removal.
Worse, Shipley was a sweeping free-market reformist, while Peters was more the moderate economic interventionist.

They fell out over privatisation. The coalition fell over.

Don Brash's even stronger attachment to free-market thinking may be one reason why Peters has been willing to do a deal with Labour.

The large degree of policy compatibility between Peters' party and Labour may also suit him. NZ First's ethos can be defined as "caring conservativism". Labour is more caring, but more fiscally conservative.

Labour and NZ First will have come to the negotiating table with relatively little baggage from past dealings.

Nine years on from NZ First's spurning of Labour in the 1996 negotiations, Peters, Clark and Michael Cullen are older and wiser to the compromises of MMP.

Peters likened the talks to a game of 500 and joked "if you were playing with me, you'd be pretty pleased" - a reference to the booty he has extracted by way of policy concessions.

His strongest card has been to hold out on shifting NZ First's stance from abstention on confidence and Budget motions to a positive vote backing Labour, thus rendering the Maori Party and Peter Dunne's United Future irrelevant.

But Clark held the Joker. Only she can make the numbers work; Brash cannot.

That put pressure on Peters to strike a deal with Labour. It leaves him hostage to the uncertain fortunes of a third-term administration, thus accentuating the need for NZ First to keep its distance from Labour, especially as a majority of NZ First voters - roughly two to one - wanted him to go with National post-election.

Taking a ministerial job would seem counterproductive to that.

NZ First could try to maintain its distance by sitting well apart from Labour in Parliament. But such symbolism will not prevent it being regarded as part and parcel of a Labour Government.

The logic for Peters taking a ministerial role may reside in him realising his negotiating power is at its zenith. Once a deal is signed, that leverage fades substantially. Labour can ignore him. His only weapon is to tear up his agreement with Clark and withdraw his support.

It is an empty threat. Bringing down the Government is not an option. It would be even less attractive if the timing of Peters' policy "wins" is staggered over the next three years - the smart thing for Labour to have done.

He may thus judge it wise to take an oversight role to ensure Labour delivers to his core constituencies, particularly the elderly.

Being in fierce competition for the Grey Power vote, Peters will want to be making the announcements, rather than standing in the background while some Labour minister captures the sound-bites.

It is also conceivable his deal with Labour could insert more NZ First MPs into ministerial posts if things are working satisfactorily from Peters' viewpoint.

If not, and Peters wants to distance his party from Labour, it would be sensible to have a "safety valve" clause allowing him to ditch the ministerial job without destabilising the Government.

It is also possible he and Labour will come up with some kind of new constitutional mechanism allowing Peters more freedom to speak out.

As a last resort, he could opt to invoke the existing, but rarely used "agree to disagree" clause in the Cabinet manual far more frequently, arguing that his lowly position in the ministerial pecking-order hardly undermines Labour's authority.

Peters is going to have to be something of a contortionist. He will have to find a way of criticising Labour without blatantly doing so, at the same time justifying why he is keeping Labour in office.

However, Labour needs to do some soul-searching about its failure to help minor partners such as the Alliance and United Future keep their heads above water.

Dunne gambled that United Future would be rewarded with a "stability dividend" at the polling booths for propping up Labour and making minimal fuss.

It wasn't. The lesson is that support parties which keep their toys in the cot get as much thanks from voters as those which chuck them out.

That will not be lost on Peters.

His prospective return to a ministerial suite in the Beehive is a further challenge to the adequacy of the first-past-the-post flavoured, Westminster-based Cabinet manual.

The rules do not allow minor party leaders in a coalition the freedom to rip into the Government they are supporting when they feel like it. Peters may be about to change all that.