John Armstrong: Crystal-clear but carefully wrapped message for Field

Quit now. Quit while you can leave Parliament with at least a modicum of your dignity intact.

Quit now. Or find yourself suffering the ignominy of being banished from Parliament by not being selected as a Labour candidate at the next election.

For someone who yesterday professed to have nothing new to say about Phillip Field, the Prime Minister could not have been clearer that the disgraced MP's future with Labour is quite simply no future.

While also declaring there was "virtually nothing new" in the latest batch of allegations levelled at the Mangere MP, she and her senior colleagues have obviously decided the time has come to cut him adrift, rather than endure more embarrassment should further claims of inappropriate behaviour emerge from the woodwork.

Not that a transcript of yesterday's post-Cabinet press conference would show the Prime Minister being anywhere near as emphatic as that.

However, there are ways of saying things without expressing them directly. As is Helen Clark's frequent wont, she left her audience to fill in the gaps.

She had to do it that way so she has deniability should Mr Field not get the message and get angry with her instead.

She could not be seen to be issuing ultimatums. He is now a mere backbench MP. While she could move to have him expelled from the Labour Party, she is powerless to oust him from Parliament.

If he ignored a direct challenge to quit, she would look weak.

As for expulsion, that would be a long and messy process. Mr Field would have rights of appeal. It would only drag out the pain.

So the Prime Minister instead dropped big hints as to what might be in Mr Field's best interests.

She suggested anyone who had been humiliated in the fashion he had been would bound to be "considering what their career prospects were". That was her way of saying he had none.

While refusing to spell out what the Labour Party should do or not do, she helpfully pointed out that candidate selections could begin late next year.

That gives Mr Field little more than 12 months to declare he is not standing again.

He could fight to hold on to his candidacy but would be deemed unsuitable by Labour's head office.

He could resign from Parliament and fight a byelection as an independent and lose in one of Labour's safest seats.

He could spit the dummy and become an independent MP for the rest of this Parliament.

The latter is what really worries Labour and why the Prime Minister is being so cautious.

Push him too hard and he might start casting his vote against Labour. That does not matter on confidence motions where Labour has a buffer of votes thanks to the Greens' abstention.

It does matter when it comes to passing legislation. Labour could end up needing the backing of three out of four other parties - NZ First , United Future, the Greens and the Maori Party. Labour's legislative programme could become paralysed if Mr Field defects.

The latter prospect meant there was a big risk in the Prime Minister saying anything yesterday.

Her punt is that he will see the benefit of quitting soon - or, as a minimum, at least flagging his retirement at the next election.

It was all carefully wrapped up as an invitation rather than an ultimatum. But the message from the Prime Minister is crystal-clear.


GOVERNMENT ON FIELD

* "While the report does not find wrongdoing by Mr Field, it does imply errors of judgment." - Prime Minister Helen Clark on 18 July, the day the Ingram report was released.

* In Helen Clark's absence from Parliament Deputy Prime Minister Michael Cullen steps up the criticism which she later repeats, to say the report contains "significant errors of judgment". - July 20.

* "Being a minister is about judgment and there wasn't good judgment shown here. It's clear to me that Mr Field got much too close to people who were coming to him for help." - Helen Clark, July 24.

* "I have a view that there are issues that resonate within the beltway and issues which resonate beyond the beltway." - Helen Clark, August 15, on why the issue didn't appear to be impacting in the polls.

* "In light of any humiliation like this any person would consider what their career prospects might be ... I'm saying that anyone in this circumstance would consider their position." - Helen Clark yesterday.