KEY POINTS:
More than 10 years after its adoption, MMP continues to produce some odd politics. What are we to make of the behaviour of Parliament's latest party deserter, Gordon Copeland? He is in the House only because the leader of his former party, United Future, holds an electorate seat. The party did not win enough votes nationwide to qualify for seats in its own right, but two other members were returned on leader Peter Dunne's coat-tails.
One, Mr Copeland, has since parted company with Mr Dunne, yet assumes an independent right to remain in Parliament. Not only that, he has given his vote to the National Party to cast as it wishes on any issue save those that Labour declares to be a matter of confidence in the Government. He wants to be considered "the 49th member of National's caucus", though since he will not be at its meetings he will have no say on how it uses his vote.
Why, if he wishes to be independent, would he surrender his options so completely? And why, if he has such confidence in National's judgment, has he reserved his position on issues of confidence? If his vote was crucial to the Government's survival, the last question would be easy to answer; he would not want to bring about a general election, at least not until he might manage to revive a conservative Christian party along the lines of Future New Zealand, which fused with Mr Dunne's United Party seven years ago.
But Mr Copeland's vote is not crucial. As long as the Greens abide by their agreement to abstain if they cannot support the Government on any issue of confidence, the Government will not fall. His vote is no more important than that of former Labour MP Taito Phillip Field who, pending the possible hearing of corruption charges against him, has flirted with a conservative Christian alignment for his own political future.
Mr Copeland is not the first politician from Future NZ to be disappointed in Mr Dunne. United Future's return for supporting Labour was supposed to be the creation of an official watchdog agency for the traditional family unit. But the commission Labour has established, to Mr Dunne's avowed satisfaction, is not permitted to prefer any particular family form.
Mr Copeland came to breaking point over the anti-smacking bill, which Mr Dunne supported. But having parted company on that issue, it is odd that he has thrown in his lot with National. He needs no reminding that National initiated the compromise that enabled the bill to pass.
His inconsistencies do not end there. He had been supporting a compromise proposal on the vexed legislation to set up a transtasman regulatory agency for medicines and therapeutic products. But now he has handed his vote to National, it looks more likely to be cast in the opposite direction.
And what has he been offered in return for his gift to the Opposition? "Nothing of great substance," he says. "It would be fair to say that ... I was perhaps more anxious for this to happen than they were."
His new party, he says, will not support a Labour-led government after the next election. With a change of government in the air, Mr Copeland is positioning himself to appeal for votes on the reasoning that National will need reliable supporting parties to return to power.
Mr Dunne has begun to make similar overtures from his position in the middle of the road. But that is where John Key is steering National. Mr Copeland sees more certain room for a small party on National's right. And clearly he is unconcerned that any party closing its options risks becoming a mere footstool for the larger party. He has just offered himself to National in precisely that role.
