Prime Minister Christopher Luxon (centre) alongside David Seymour (left) and Winston Peters at Waitangi. Photo / Michael Cunningham
OPINION
Shortly after becoming National Party leader, Christopher Luxon picked up the phone to former British Prime Minister David Cameron.
Luxon became leader in November. The party had its annual caucus retreat scheduled for January. Judith Collins had already booked the venue, the QT hotel in Queenstown. Luxon needed a speaker.
Cameron fitted the bill. He assumed the leadership of the British Conservatives during a particularly low ebb in the party’s political fortunes, which he was able to turn around. Cameron purged the Conservatives of racists and bigots and had himself photographed with huskies in Greenland to signal the party had woken up to the threat of climate change.
The parallels are obvious for a National Party which was itself in a spot of bother. Cameron didn’t end up speaking to the Nats. Struck down with Covid, he delegated the gig to his ally George Osbourne, the former Chancellor.
The message worked. The Nats themselves detoxified, pivoted to the centre and won Government - albeit (and much like Cameron) through an unwieldy coalition.
If the trend of the last two months continues, we could begin to draw a further parallel between Luxon and Cameron: both men will have had their careers defined by referendums they were reluctant to call and whose premise they fundamentally didn’t believe in.
Luxon, like Cameron, agreed to Act’s demand for a Treaty Principles Bill in order to form the Government, perhaps thinking that the compromise selection of supporting the bill to select committee was an elegant solution of giving Act what it wants, without compromising on National’s policy of not allowing the referendum.
Luxon and many observers may think that the hardening of his language against the bill this week - he’s now unequivocal: National won’t be backing the bill past select committee - might be enough to put the issue to rest.
He couldn’t be more wrong.
New Zealanders will vote on the bill - that was decided in coalition talks. The only power Luxon has now is to determine the manner in which they vote. This could be via an actual referendum, as Act wants; via a citizens-initiated referendum, which seems highly unlikely or by Act turning the 2026 election into a de facto referendum on its bill.
The question that’s been asked of Luxon all year is whether National would support the bill at second reading, whether he would rule out backing the bill at second reading, or some combination of these.
That is the wrong question, particularly in light of the coalition agreement.
The first question for National should be whether the party will allow the bill to have a second reading at all.
The bill will be discussed ad nauseam this year. Act and National are now both talking about it being given two rounds of consultation, first via an exposure draft and then the actual bill itself. This will drag out discussion on the bill, much to Act’s benefit and much to the detriment of National, who would prefer to change the subject.
When the bill is at select committee, National members will face the tough choice of whether to recommend the bill be passed, withdrawn or neither - and when the bill is reported back to the House, the three parties of Government must decide whether to actually bring it up for debate and a vote.
The alternative is the Kermadec solution, named after the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill which has languished on the order paper since being reported back from select committee in 2016.
This solution would require National to do nothing, neither voting the bill up or down. It would simply sit on the order paper, potentially forever or until someone brings it up for debate, in which case it would pass or fall.
Three of the 20 Government bills on the current order paper were reported back from a select committee in 2016 and 2017.
This is not a hypothetical and is being actively considered in Wellington. All the parties of Government are aware of the possibility. It’s a less than ideal situation for Luxon, as it would mean he could never put the issue to rest - something he is desperate to do. Instead, it would hang, like the Referendum of Damocles, over his head for the rest of his Government.
This suits Act well.
It can turn the 2026 election into a de facto referendum on the bill, strengthening their hand in post-election talks to allow it to progress further. That is a dream scenario for the party. It will be good for the bill’s fortunes - and even better for Act’s.
Even if the three parties of Government do bring the bill up for debate and either vote against it or abstain (in which case the opposition to the bill would win and the bill would fail), there is nothing to stop Act from campaigning on bringing the it back at the 2026 election.
The biggest challenge for National is that there is a good chance that if the question were put to the public, Act’s referendum would actually pass.
Seymour has cannily constructed a referendum question that is very difficult to disagree with. Article 1 of the Treaty will mean the Government is the Government, Article 2 will guarantee private property rights and Article 3 will guarantee equal citizenship.
Any opposition to the bill will fight a rearguard action to explain the constitutional and historical reasons why they are campaigning against government, property and equality in favour of an inegalitarian, communist anarchy. The best argument National can make against the bill is that it would precipitate a protracted and ugly political fallout.
The only poll we have so far on the bill shows it to be fairly popular. Far from being “divisive”, support is fairly steady across ages, geographies and political parties.
The Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll from last year showed 60 per cent of voters would say “yes” to Seymour’s referendum question, as written in Act’s election policy (which is similar to the leaked draft published last month). Just 18 per cent would vote “no”.
We should take this single poll with a hefty pinch of salt. We’ll get more as the year progresses, but at the moment it is just one number that was recorded during the heat of an election campaign and should be taken as interesting, rather than instructive.
Nevertheless, the age, geographic and political breakdowns - which should be taken with further pinches of salt, given their smaller sample sizes - make interesting reading.
The issue is one of a diminishing number that unite men and women, with 58 per cent of women and 62 per cent of men saying they would vote “yes”.
The pattern repeats with age breakdowns: 59 per cent of 18- to 39-year-olds, allegedly the most left-wing demographic, said they would vote “yes”, 55 per cent of 44- to 59-year-olds would also vote “yes”, and 67 per cent of those aged 60+ would vote “yes”.
The no votes among those demographics range from 15 to 23 per cent.
Support in the Green city of Wellington is 59 per cent, in Auckland it is 56 per cent and Christchurch it is 60 per cent. In provincial cities it is 62 per cent. Again, while cities and provinces diverge in almost all political views, this bill unites them - or at least it appears to. Take those regional breakdowns with a pinch of salt too.
Most alarmingly for our political parties is the fact that all of the big four parties in the last Parliament - even the Greens (just) - have more supporters who back the bill than don’t.
Sixty-six per cent of National voters back “yes”, 62 per cent of Labour voters back “yes” as do 77 per cent of Act voters along with, quite astonishingly, 34 per cent of Green voters - one point more than the percentage of Greens who would vote “no” (33 per cent).
Just 19 per cent of National voters would vote “no”, as would 28 per cent of Labour voters and 11 per cent of Act voters.
And this is the challenge for Luxon. During the exposure draft phase, Seymour, much like the pro-Brexit crowd in the UK, will be able to reach over the head of Luxon, urging National voters to lobby their MPs to at least not bring the bill up for debate and allow the public to have a say at the 2023 election. Labour, much like its British counterpart, is also the loser here, with the issue clearly dividing its progressive and conservative wings. The party thinks it can weather the storm, but acknowledges that the bill will be a rare instance in which National unleashes a political force against itself that Labour is unable to benefit from.
Luxon will then have to choose whether to thumb his nose at his own voters by bringing the bill up for debate, voting it down and risking losing support to Act.
It’s very difficult to see a way out of this Gordian knot of legislative intrigue that would work to Luxon’s advantage.
The longer this goes on, the more National stands to lose. It’s a source of tension within the coalition too. The more Seymour talks about the bill, dominating the Government’s agenda, the more Luxon makes clear there is no way he’d support it. Seymour is fast discovering good faith works both ways.
The focus on the bill will abate as the news agenda moves to other issues, particularly when the Government moves to roll out some of the more retail points in its 100-day plan.
But there’s no running from the fact that a good deal of time this year will be spent talking about the proposal, likely to the detriment of National’s fortunes.
The cost to National will be great, but that also means Luxon might be willing to pay a great price to get rid of the problem, bringing it to a vote early and dispatching it from Parliament well out from the 2026 election. Seymour might extract a mighty prize for this. Luxon may decide it’s a price worth paying.
The way Alexander the Great untangled the Gordian knot was to simply slice his way through it.
It follows concerns about use-of-force powers being given to staff.