Jonathan Milne: Outsiders worm way to centre stage

Peter Dunne and Jim Anderton were so determined to get on to Thursday night's election debate that they had their flights booked even before the judge had ordered their inclusion.

This newspaper was similarly determined to not be left out, and so applied its own version of the Worm - the Herald on Sunday Evaluator (the HoSE) - to the real opening debate of this year's election campaign, held in the grey-walled High Court at Wellington.

Opening the speaking was Queen's Counsel David Goddard, representing United Future leader Peter Dunne and Progressives leader Jim Anderton. Dressed smartly but safely in an Ermenegildo Zegna Italian pinstriped blue suit and dark blue tie, he engaged well with the audience, sometimes leaning right forward on the lectern to make his point and show off his gold cufflinks.

He argued that TV3, though a private company, entered a public arena overseen by the courts when it hosted its political leaders' debate.

"Later on tomorrow evening TV3 is showing Sex and the City. It is not suggested that that is a matter of public importance," he said, by way of contrast.

The audience laughed, the HoSE climbed into positive territory, and the host of the debate, Justice Ron Young, declared he was relieved to hear that.

Though Goddard had a height advantage, TV3 lawyer John Tizard compensated with his stronger voice, critical in such a debate and useful for the occasional interjection.

As five o'clock drew near with Goddard still only part way through his opening statement, Goddard asked Justice Young: "Your Honour, would you like to finish me off tonight?"

Tizard cut in with: "I'd like to finish you off." But Tizard's more confrontational style did not go down so well with the HoSE, which values the qualities of positivity, motherhood and apple pie.

His conservative Topline Tailors bespoke pinstriped suit was marred by his bright crimson, blue and gold striped tie - though it was nowhere near as bad as the shiny paua shell monstrosity Jim Anderton would exhibit during the TV3 debate.

And Tizard struggled to explain why, by including two more leaders in the television debate that evening, each leader would be left only three minutesto speak.

Justice Young remarked: "It looks to me as if the presenter is getting half the time - without standing for Parliament."

Goddard agreed: "One option, obviously, is perhaps for Mr Campbell to talk a little less."

TV3's maligned host, John Campbell, had his chance to respond that evening during his debate, broadcast live from Auckland Grammar School - and respondhe did.

While party leaders such as Tariana Turia were given little more than three minutes to voice their thoughts to the nation, Campbell's voice filled up nearly 15 minutes of the one-hour debate.

Justice Young may have ruled that Dunne and Anderton should be included in TV3's debate, but the wider implications of both debates - that in Courtroom Two, and that in Auckland Grammar School's library - are still to emerge.

Media freedom advocates are alarmed at the judicial intervention in TV3's decision about how to run its election debate. It could set a precedent for further intervention: already Destiny NZ has signalled it will use the ruling to protest its exclusion from a candidates debate on TVNZ's Marae show.

And what is now to stop NZ First leader Winston Peters (who likes to describe the election as a three-horse race) demanding the court include him in Radio NZ's head-to-head debate between Helen Clark and Don Brash this Saturday?

Justice Young's decision is unhelpful, but no industry is better positioned to lobby to protect its own interests than the media. Lobby it will.

Regrettably, TV3 opened the gate to such intervention with its undemocratic and completely unjustifiable decision to exclude the two small party leaders.

Today's Herald on Sunday-DigiPoll shows the Greens, the Maori Party, Act, United Future and the Progressives all hiding beneath the 5 per cent threshold that would return them to Parliament.

Forums like the TV3 debate, and similar debates scheduled by other television and radio stations and running every week in the newspapers, allow the small parties to go head-to-head with the bigger parties.

The 2002 Worm debate allowed Dunne's modulated voice and moderate views to be heard by a wider audience than ever before, and contributed to United Future's leap in the polls.

Nobody has heard of Jim Anderton for the past three years - but the election campaign allows him to appear on the nationalstage again.

Nobody may ever hear of Act leader Rodney Hide again after this election, but the campaign gives him a last chance to save himself.

Ratings indicate 409,000 people watched TV3's debate on Thursday night, and it beat even Coronation Stin a key Auckland demographic.

A month out from the election, New Zealand is tuning in to politics.

That can only be good for the small parties: their polling will improve in coming weeks as their quieter voices begin to be heard, well beyond Courtroom Two and Auckland Grammar School library.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY