The new Government gets set for its first cabinet meeting, was Black Friday a hit or miss for retailers? And the truce in Gaza gets extended in the latest NZ Herald headlines. Video / NZ Herald
OPINION
This is a transcript of Audrey Young’s subscriber-only Premium Politics newsletter. To sign up, click on your profile at nzherald.co.nz and select ‘Newsletters’. For a step-by-step guide, click here.
Welcome to the Politics Briefing on the first full day of the coalition Government. All the signs arethat it is going to be a contentious three years.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has been shown how easy it is to lose control of the narrative. The first three days after the unveiling of the coalition agreements were dominated by plans to repeal Smokefree laws aimed at getting New Zealand under 5 per cent smokers by 2025. It has made global headlines as well as domestic ones.
And it is Luxon’s first lesson in having to take responsibility - even if he wasn’t entirely to blame.
The law, which was passed in late 2022, would make it illegal to sell cigarettes to people born after January 1, 2009, would reduce the number of dairies that could sell cigarettes from about 6000 to 600, and would reduce the amount of nicotine in cigarettes to very low levels.
National and Act opposed the bill at its third reading. National, which originally set up the Smokefree target, wanted it done by denicotinisation, not the other two measures. New Zealand First wasn’t in Parliament but would almost certainly have opposed it as well.
Repeal of the law was not campaigned on publicly - no leader drew attention to their policy - but it was in the New Zealand First manifesto and Act’s updated fiscal plan. I drew attention to it in this newsletter after the pre-election fiscal update - “the other change in the new plan is to add a $1 billion revenue in cigarette tax over four years by reversing the Very Low Nicotine Content Rules which slash the amount of nicotine in cigarettes”.
Finance Minister Nicola Willis was no doubt thrilled to have an alternative source of potential revenue to compensate for the blocked foreign buyers’ tax, which New Zealand First was prepared to die in a ditch for. She won’t be so thrilled to be grilled on it next week when Parliament resumes.
Finance Minister Nicola Willis. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Meanwhile, I’ve done a piece on how the coalition Government plans to legislate to overturn a recent ruling of the Court of Appeal on the foreshore and seabed. The court judgment has the effect of changing the test for customary marine title under the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Act 2011 - making it easier to get.
On a related matter, I think I should expand on a reference I made in an opinion piece on the new Cabinet in reference to the new Defence Minister, Judith Collins, admiring German general Erwin Rommel. She hasn’t complained but there was some social media comment with raised eyebrows about her admiration for a Nazi. The following full quote will put it in perspective. When I asked her 20 years ago soon after she entered Parliament to name one of her heroes, this is what she said: “I really admire the qualities that the German general Field Marshal Rommel displayed in leadership and his personal ethics. That’s from being the daughter of a World War II veteran who, like most New Zealanders who fought in the desert, hugely admired Rommel.
“He was incredibly professional. He never asked of people what he wouldn’t do himself. His officers had the same rations as the men. There was none of this hierarchy or special treatment. He made a point of visiting the captured Allied soldiers and making sure they had decent treatment. And when he finally got his head around what Hitler was all about, he actually made a stand against him and lost his life because of it. So I thought he was a pretty good guy. He was just on the wrong side.”
I’m glad that’s cleared up.
Quote unquote
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters. Photo / Mark Mitchell
“You cannot defend $55 million of bribery” - Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters about the previous government’s Public Interest Journalism Fund.
“You can bet your bottom dollar that this particular Deputy Prime Minister and serial litigant would at least threaten to haul someone through the courts if they levelled the same baseless accusation at him” - Newshub political editor Jenna Lynch.
Which Cabinet minister has the middle name Valentine? (Answer below.)
Brickbat
To the BBC regarding “Sir” Michael Baker - the much-respected Otago University Professor who appeared last night over the planned repeal of the Smokefree law has not been knighted. And while we are at it, Shane Jones is not the deputy leader of New Zealand First, unless the caucus has elected him to the job this morning.
Bouquet
David Seymour’s interviews since the coalition agreements were revealed on Friday have been an oasis of calm and sanity. Even if you don’t agree with him, he usually sticks to policy and explains it well.
Quiz answer: Nicola Willis, National’s deputy leader and the Finance Minister. It is the surname of her mother, former radio journalist Shona Valentine.
Audrey Young is the New Zealand Herald’s senior political correspondent. She was named Political Journalist of the Year at the Voyager Media Awards in 2023, 2020 and 2018.
For more political news and views, listen to On the Tiles, the Herald’s politics podcast.
