John Armstrong: Once the rebel - now in need of a cause

Winston Peters prefers nationwide speaking tours over social network websites to attract supporters. Photo / Doug Sherring

When it comes to Twitter, Facebook, anonymous bloggers and other manifestations of cyberspace, count Winston Peters out.

"We are not a Facebook party," he declares, sounding almost proud that NZ First has not succumbed to relying on pitching for votes via the internet.

"We do it the old-fashioned way. We go out and talk to people. The trouble with Facebook parties is that they leave as fast as they arrive."

In fact, his party has succumbed. It has several Facebook pages, one in Mr Peters' name and one selling "Bring Back Winston" T-shirts for $25.

But you get his drift. His idea of "social networking" is a long string of nationwide speaking engagements.

"The feedback is that it is working for us. And there is plenty of ammunition out there," he adds for those who point to the polls as indicating John Key and National are immune from any threat he might pose.

Mr Peters is not going to waste time talking about the polls. The major ones, however, may play a critical role in determining NZ First's fate come November.

It is Catch-22 for the party. Fear of wasting their vote means potential supporters will have to be convinced NZ First can beat the 5 per cent threshold before they will vote for it. But Mr Peters needs those supporters on board now to provide the proof that NZ First can breach the threshold.

The party's website highlights the Roy Morgan poll which has twice had NZ First topping 5 per cent this year. But the party is stuck at around 3 per cent in the more influential television polls.

To elevate himself into serious contention, Mr Peters needs to find a new and pressing cause which has NZ First taking a markedly different stance from other parties, yet remaining firmly on side with majority public opinion.

There is no obvious example. If Mr Peters has something in mind, he is not revealing it. At least not yet.

In his absence from Parliament, other parties have rifled through NZ First's drawers and pilfered anything of potential political value.

The Greens, for example, have adopted a tougher regime on land sales to foreigners, while Act now claims to be the party fighting Maori separatism.

Mr Peters is now trying to gain traction by focusing on the rising cost of living. But so, too, is Labour.

He argues that while other parties will promise to do things, the reality is they won't. "The difference is we would."

"Our time will come again," he reassures audiences such as the one gathered in the Porirua Club on an autumnal Tuesday afternoon.

With its once futuristic-looking but now dated lampshades, and its wood-beamed sloping ceiling, the club's cavernous lounge and bar is pure 1970s - fitting, perhaps, given it is a rare Peters' speech which does not tap into nostalgia for a simpler, gentler New Zealand.

The last time Mr Peters addressed the Tawa-Mana branch of Grey Power was back in August 2008 when he was being blitzed with all kinds of allegations surrounding political donations to his party.

The 150 or so pensioners present that day gave his speech a polite but less than rapturous reception. Three months later NZ First was tossed out of Parliament.

Fast forward two years or so. Same venue; same branch of Grey Power.

And a similar sized audience.

They get classic Peters. His locks may be a little whiter - he turned 66 this month - but the enforced time-out from Parliament has not dimmed the passion. He is at his argumentative and hectoring best. His speech develops his standard "us versus them" dynamic, the "us" being him and his audience; the "them" being the political and business elites, the Australian-owned trading banks, the service-cutting bureaucratic razor gangs and, of course, the media.

He teases those in the audience who voted National. He answers one woman's question by asking her if she belongs to the Mother Teresa Society. "The worse they [National] treat you, the more you forgive them."

The speech gets ... well ... a polite but less than rapturous reception.

The only spontaneous applause is for a promise to extend the NZ First-initiated Supergold card to include one free GP-conducted health check-up a year for pensioners, while capping the cost of further visits at $10.

Mr Peters' efforts to reconnect with voters is seriously hampered by three factors.

First, though entertaining as always, he offers the same product he was three, six or even nine years ago - he accuses Mr Key of "government by public relations, platitudes, photo opportunities and political correctness to the power of 10".

There is a lack of buzz or excitement which might help to sway voters into thinking his resurrection would make an appreciable difference to the country's fortunes.

Second, there is no palpable mood for a change of government.

Third, the National Party has rarely been more popular. That means slim pickings for NZ First on the centre-right.

Indeed, Mr Key has used National's current position of strength to try to write Mr Peters out of the election campaign by making him irrelevant to the outcome.

Mr Peters has a ready answer to Mr Key, saying National will not entertain a coalition or some other governing arrangement with the NZ First leader.

If necessary, NZ First will sit outside Government on Parliament's cross-benches - the unstated corollary being that a re-elected National would still likely have to come to NZ First on bended knee to get at least some of its legislation through the House.

Mr Peters does have some things going for him. NZ First could yet pick up some of Labour's vote if disenchantment with the major Opposition party deepens.

National is also flagging a more radical second-term agenda, including selling off portions of state-owned enterprises.

That is perfect fodder for Mr Peters. But again the Opposition ground is very crowded.

Will Mr Peters get on a political roll? He can rely - at least in the early stages of the four-week election campaign proper - on getting heaps more coverage than other non-parliamentary parties. He might yet hijack the campaign if Labour Leader Phil Goff sinks and the result becomes a foregone conclusion.

If NZ First looks like it is going to make it, Mr Peters will get all the attention he wants. If not, the TV cameras will be pointing elsewhere and he will struggle to be heard.

Vital, then, that he finds some emotion-charged issue which he can make his and his alone and which propels him back into the limelight and, just as importantly, keeps him there.