Editorial: Clark team needs more fresh blood

Opinion

When a rugby team is leading the match it seems reluctant to make many substitutions. It normally makes a few late in the game, but those appear to be more for the purpose of matching the fresh legs brought on by the Opposition than in any real hope of lifting its own performance. Labour's latest Cabinet reshuffle has a late-in-the-game look about it.

It contains more changes than we have seen for six years, but most of the substitutes have been waiting on the bench for all that time. Damien O'Connor and David Cunliffe have been ministers outside the Cabinet, Clayton Cosgrove has never seemed far away and Lianne Dalziel, of course, has been in the sinbin. Only Nanaia Mahuta and David Parker are new names at this level. Both are young and Mr Parker has been entrusted with two big ministries, energy and transport, where he will be under pressure from the Greens. He will also be Attorney-General.

The newcomers will attract some interest but if Helen Clark's team is to find a new lease of life at this stage, she will probably have to look to the positional changes she has made among those who have been there since the start. And like the leader of any successful side, she knows that changes can just as easily cause it to lose momentum. Moving Trevor Mallard out of education, for example, and Annette King out of health, leaves two crucial sectors of Government activity to be handled by ministers unused to the particular demands of those positions.

The new Minister of Health, Pete Hodgson, has safe hands and will relish the challenge of justifying the priorities that must be made for finite services facing infinite demands. But he was a particular enthusiast for the Kyoto climate change project and his removal from that role suggests the carbon tax review that Labour has conceded to New Zealand First may be serious.

The new Minister of Education, Steve Maharey, has been less impressive. He has held associated roles in that field and seems not to get things done. Helen Clark has transferred his tertiary education responsibility to Finance Minister Michael Cullen and stripped him also of social policy which she has given to another former education minister, the hapless David Benson-Pope. The teacher unions will welcome Mr Maharey as a more pliant minister than they had in Mr Mallard.

Mr Mallard moves to the economic development ministry that was created by Jim Anderton. Mr Anderton's demotion, in responsibilities if not in ranking, is interesting. He made it known he wanted a move to education but probably had more in mind that an associate role in the tertiary sector.

Another positional swap involves Phil Goff and Mark Burton, who have exchanged defence and justice. Mr Goff, who relinquished foreign affairs to the leader of New Zealand First, has kept the trade component of that portfolio with others that could not be entrusted to the non-member of the team. With important Doha round meetings pending, Jim Sutton remains Minister of Trade Negotiations but Mr Goff, named an associate in that role, is clearly preparing to take over.

The substitute that immediately catches the public eye is Mrs King, who replaces George Hawkins as Minister of Police. But her instructions will be to take the public eye off recurring police problems as effectively as she took the heat out of health issues.

After two terms the Government probably needs more drastic changes than Helen Clark has been able to make. She faces a National opposition buoyed by a close election result and a line-up of new talent from electorates it won from Labour. The Government, though, has almost all the losers back on its list. They will need to find fresh heart in their new positions if this term is not to be their last.