Why Prime Minister Christopher Luxon punched back when Act leader David Seymour pushed his luck too far on Treaty bill, writes Claire Trevett

The last week should have been a lesson for Act leader David Seymour in how Prime Minister Christopher Luxon will respond when you push your luck, although whether he’s learned is debatable.

On the day after Waitangi Day, Luxon was trying to get back to talking about things other than Seymour’s bill on the Treaty principles. Cue the 100 Day Plan and the surefire attention-grabbing topic of Auckland’s transport.

There was the scrapping of the Auckland Regional Fuel Tax: gone at the end of June. Given everybody knew it was coming, it was mainly interesting because Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown then warned the loss of revenue would mean scrapping some roading projects in the city.

The canny Brown even identified a few likely casualties - one of which was the final stage of the Eastern Busway into Botany township, the heart of the PM’s electorate, and another was the proposed Airport-Botany Busway.

Funnily enough, the very next day Transport Minister Simeon Brown issued his priorities for the transport statement, including at the top of the list the Eastern Busway and the Airport to Botany Busway.

However, Luxon still ended up talking about Act’s Treaty bill more than roads, taxes and buses to Botany.

Seymour will feel disgruntled by Luxon’s move this week to make it crystal clear that National would not support Act’s Treaty Principles Bill beyond the first reading.

However, Seymour only has himself to blame for putting Luxon into an increasingly difficult position and making it harder for him not to spell that out.

Luxon’s decision to make it clear was forced by Act deciding to launch a website on the issue, the stated aim of which was to try to force National to change its mind by trying to drum up popular support for it. It’s the kind of thing a party does in Opposition, not in coalition.

As far as Luxon was concerned, that went beyond the agree-to-disagree clauses in the coalition agreement and bordered on a misrepresentation of National’s policy.

Up until that point, Luxon had been happy to give Seymour some air to get the debate going around his bill but, once he deemed Seymour was taking advantage of that, he decided to punch back.

There have been suggestions that in doing so, Luxon has somehow fallen foul of the “good faith” clauses of the coalition agreements by not leaving the question open as to whether National would support it beyond its limited initial commitment.

That is doubtful. Even if Luxon had fallen foul of good faith, Seymour’s response to Luxon’s unequivocal statement that National would not support the bill beyond its first reading was a far more serious foul.

Seymour went on television and said he thought Luxon had simply been “spooked”. He added that he didn’t believe Luxon would end up opposing it if the public supported it, despite Luxon saying he would not support it even if there was a massive groundswell of public support. It was presumably Seymour’s effort to apply a bit of CPR to the relevancy of the bill.

However, it amounted to publicly questioning whether Luxon can be trusted on his word – and that is simply not something any coalition partner should do.

Seymour’s casting of aspersions on Luxon’s word will only further cement in National’s “no” votes. Trust is hard-earned, and Luxon cannot fail an early test.

Luxon has downplayed that publicly rather than risk an outright war of words, but behind closed doors there is no doubt Seymour has been told to pull his head in.

As for whether Seymour should feel disgruntled, he may indeed feel Luxon has tried to treat the whole exercise as a box-ticking exercise on the coalition agreement, something to be endured and then locked away in the crypt as soon as possible.

That will suit Luxon, because it is completely accurate. As things stand, Luxon knows that Act is isolated on the bill. No other party in Parliament will vote for it. It has no high ground to occupy on it. In fact, even if Seymour had been able to convince National to support it, it would have failed since there is no way NZ First would do so.

Suggestions Seymour might now be able to extract some kind of a price or extra bargain out of National for all of this are ridiculous.

The accounting has already been done: the receipts are in the coalition agreement and what is in the agreement is still in line to be delivered to the letter.

There was no implicit or explicit promise in that agreement that National would wait until after the public debate to decide whether to then support it into law. National considers that its position against the bill was always just as strong as Seymour’s was in favour. It was never going to be up for negotiation.

If Seymour was genuinely under the impression Luxon might be swayed, he has not been listening.

He might consider that Luxon’s declaration has prematurely rendered it a waste of time, but it was always a waste of time.

It has afforded Luxon the opportunity to look like a Prime Minister by taking the stance that he would do what he considered right, rather than what he considered popular.

Seymour’s insistence that popularity is the test for whether it should happen has helped ensure that popularity should never be the metric for changes impacting on the Treaty.

As for Seymour, there are those baffled as to why Seymour is investing so much effort and time on it urging him to instead put his efforts into the core bread and butter stuff Act has pursued.

Both men say the personal relationship between them remains solid and there is no suggestion it is something that will threaten stability.

However, it has been an intriguing week of watching Luxon go about showing who is ultimately boss.

If Seymour thinks he can play silly buggers and drag the whole thing out or keep the bill as a live issue, he may find out otherwise.

It is frustrating National that it has taken up so much oxygen and Seymour is trying to create more. There is a belief – apparently backed by internal polling - that while it does speak to a certain part of Act’s support base, it is hurting Act overall with its traditional base and those voters who went to Act from National through those six years in Opposition.

Seymour may be lucky Luxon is a Christian man, since the stoush over the Treaty principles bill shows the motto of turning the other cheek is likely to come into play a fair few times over the coming years.

However, Luxon has shown sometimes he’s happy to slap back when he thinks it’s warranted.