Matt McCarten: Labour should have put the workers first

Scarily, the outcome of the election was decided by the huge number of swinging voters who made their decision standing in the booth with their ballot paper.

How did it happen? The Labour Party was 20 points ahead when Michael Cullen announced his Budget, but Labour obviously didn't pick up on the growing resentment that people thought they were over-taxed. You could feel the blue collar vote slide away from Labour, and Don Brash and the Nats seized their opportunity.

Bribing the electorate with their own money and putting Maori in their place were two messages that got traction. Many low-paid workers think a tax cut will put more in their pocket. They also swallowed Brash's line on Maori privileges.

Labour was always going to be under attack on both fronts over the Maori question. With the Maori Party breathing down their necks on one side, saying Maori were getting shafted, and the right-wing parties on the other, saying Maori were getting special privileges, Labour was on the defensive from the start. Thirty thousand new Maori voters enrolled during this campaign.

Maori knew they were the political football. Tariana Turia was safe in her seat, but the other six seats were up for grabs.

Predictably the most fiercely fought seat was Tamaki Makaurau. Both John Tamihere and Pita Sharples are recognised as significant leaders in their own right and it is unfortunate that both of them will not be in Parliament.

Two significant future Maori leaders were elected last night: Hone Harawira, who, as predicted, won Te Tai Tokerau for the Maori Party, and Shane Jones for Labour. Jones will replace Tamihere as the new face of Maori in the Labour Party. He has crossover appeal to Pakeha and is intelligent and charismatic. More importantly, unlike Tamihere, Jones is careful and safe. There is no reason why he cannot be New Zealand's first Maori Prime Minster.

What this election has shown is that Helen Clark and Michael Cullen are close to their use-by date. Brash was hopeless in this campaign, but Clark wasn't much better.

Labour's Maori MPs are weak but their new line-up of backbench MPs is even worse. While National has gone out and recruited outside talent, Labour has continued to reward its party hacks and time-servers with high list places. When Clark inevitably goes, the Labour Party will not have the depth of talent to stay in contention.

Let's face it - Labour is no longer a workers' party. It's a liberal social democratic party. It's full of teachers, technocrats and tired trade union staffers.

What the Nats have shown us in this campaign is that they know who their constituency is and they fight for it. Despite Labour doing a good job for the economy, big business doesn't want them in Government.

The business sector in this campaign has shown it is partisan. Labour needs to understand that the only way they will ever stay in power is if they put workers' needs first, not the needs of big business. The Left may have got away with it this time, but it's a mistake that must never happen again.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY