Richard Prebble – Rolling with the punches

In the far-right corner New Zealand's most pugnacious politician is ready for allcomers. Fending off leadership rumbles, Act's veteran slugger tells CARROLL du CHATEAU what drives him.

The cluster of protesters huddle like the All Blacks when someone is carted off the field as the banana-yellow Act bus drives down the main street blaring its message: "This is Richard Prebble of the Act Party, urging you to tell your MP to say 'no' to the new Employment Relations Bill ..." The moment the bus stops and Prebble begins his anti-ERB patter, the abuse begins. "Bullshit! It'll give employees rights they haven't had for years ... How would you like it if you went for a job Richard and you were told, 'sign that'?" Then, because the bus has stopped on yellow lines, "Let's make a citizen's arrest."

Richard Prebble CBE, aged 52, leader of the Act Party, soapbox speaker, muck-raker, vociferous opponent of Labour's ERB and undoubtedly the most effective opposition politician in Parliament, is unfazed.

He stands there in his garbardine raincoat with the classy maroon lining ("Your suit cost more than people round here make in a month"), under an umbrella, rain driving into his face, slugging it out like the punchy little street fighter he is. Despite the insults, he never stops smiling, talking to these angry "mates" — thinking of ways to win them over.

Later, as his six staff and supporters clamber aboard Act's mobile electorate office, Prebble insists it was a good meeting. At least people came. He shows no sign of disappointment that of the 10,000 small employers targeted with leaflets supporting Act's "Leading The Fight-back" roadshow, none turned up. "I've walked through picket lines — this is nothing. Once you start giving people information they cool down."

He should know. Prebble's bravery is legendary. As the rookie 27-year-old Labour Member for Auckland Central he was one of the few MPs brave — or mad — enough to stand up to then Prime Minister Rob Muldoon. Despite his ability to think through to the core of a problem, it was Prebble's Muldoon-baiting, coupled with his astonishingly ruthless 80s privatisation drive, that drove him to public attention. The cartoonists caricatured him as "Mad Dog" — and it stuck. Then, as now, he seemed impervious. When the party had an unpopular job to do, Prebble was its man.

Both anti and pro-Prebble punters concede that only he was capable of three things. One, taking on Muldoon. Two, dismantling entrenched bureaucracies including the Railways (chopping 24,000 employees to 4500 "and they carried 50 per cent more freight") and three, pushing the Act party above the 5 per cent threshold which guarantees representation in the House.

But recently the Anglican Archdeacon's son from Symonds St has fallen from grace. His high-profile mauling of Labour MP John Tamihere, plus his part in exposing the now-sacked Minister of Maori Affairs Dover Samuels, have earned him a new, grubbier reputation for Maori bashing and dirt mongering. Even his tears in Parliament after the announcement of George Speight's Fiji coup were dismissed as crocodile.

By mid-July Act was polling at 5 per cent (down from 12 per cent before the election) while 59 per cent of people told a poll that they disapproved of Prebble drawing attention to the Samuels allegations.

Although Prebble points out that Act is polling better than ever — "we've consistently polled as the third party, ahead of the Alliance, New Zealand First and the Greens" — rumours of a leadership change and unrest in the party, which is stacked with more messiah-like right- wingers including president Sir Roger Douglas, former Finance Minister Ruth Richardson and big brainer Derek Quigley, were strong.

Not so, says Act MP Rodney Hide, who insists he is "behind Prebs 110 per cent." But the wily Prebble has been outmanoevured by an even wilier Prime Minister, determined to capture the high moral ground — and dump Samuels at the same time. "Helen [Clark] did a very, very, successful job making him the villain. Prebs was left unable to say anything because whatever he said would be damaging to the young woman [at the heart of the Dover Samuels scandal]."

Hide insists Prebble is "a big softie inside an enormously strong, tough man. His heart went out to that young woman and indeed to Dover and his family. He never broke. He stood up to everyone dumping on him. He never attacked Dover, never raised the matter in Parliament, refused to go on the Holmes show — which is a big thing for any politician." For all that, "Richard's taken a hammering and Act's feeling it."

Former Act MP Patricia Schnauer, well known for her dislike of gutter politics, agrees. "Labour has done a very good job of painting Act as an extreme party ... Right now there are no strong alternative policy ideas."

Sir Roger Douglas concurs. "We did a brilliant job last week, leading the charge against the ERB, but you have to be concerned about the fact that if you raise some issues they tend to over-shadow others."

However, despite rumours of Douglas' preference for freshman MP Stephen Franks, Act is standing firm behind Prebble. For now. Says Richardson, "He shows all the characteristics of a successful opposition leader — an ability to go for the jugular, galvanise debate round an issue.

"Would we bump him? No, we're not into that at all."

Others suggest Act has lost its way. Says Andrew Culley, a foundation Act suppporter: "Nobody knows what Act stands for any more. The Roger Douglas ideals were clear. You keep most of what you earn.

"Any redistribution is done transparently and honestly. Personal choice is the first best option. But you've got to have someone — like President Clinton — who connects with the people to sell the message."

Meanwhile, Prebble's performance over the past few weeks shows signs of a rebore. The personal attacks are gone. Instead, his focus is policy, specifically the ERB. Like that bullet-headed caricature in the Energiser battery ad, Prebble, sparks flying, is indefatigable. Commuting between Auckland and Wellington, orchestrating the Labour-baiting at question time, cheekily breaking parliamentary privilege to conduct seminars for business people before the Bill was tabled.

Why infuriate his parliamentary colleagues yet again? "People have the right to know what's in this Bill," says Prebble, fixing me with those unwavering blue eyes. "The original draft was 198 pages and every business in New Zealand must understand it by October 1 or they [could break the rules and] be fined $10,000. Law firms are charging $500. We're doing it for free."

2 pm, Waihi: A man sticks his chest into Prebble's, jabs his finger and spits out the words with an anger built up over a session in the Rob Roy pub and 15 years in the economic wilderness. "I was a trade unionist before you were born ..." His mate in gumboots, shorts, bush-shirt and ponytail joins in. Their message: You and your mates have done us in. You want people to work for $8 an hour? We need some parity. We'd rather be unemployed. And later, "You sold the railways, Mr Prebble."

Is it idealism or evangelism that drives Richard Prebble? Combined with an insatiable appetite for politics, probably both. Growing up in Labour-leaning vicarages where his mother Mary, a trained nurse and midwife during the Blitz, took in university students to make extra money, meant the Prebble kids knew the way upwards was through study and education.

The entire family — he has four brothers and a sister — is brainy, high achieving. Richard, the third-eldest, has a BA in political studies and an LLB.

When his father, Kenneth, retired as Archdeacon, his parents became Catholics. They also joined Act, still enjoy meetings. Says Kenneth, "What shook me was the realisation that the country was broke. My fundamental conviction is that we cannot have an increase in social services unless we [the country] becomes wealthier."

His son, whom the gentle Kenneth maintains is "cruelly misunderstood," is driven by the same beliefs. Says Richard, "I still believe in equal opportunities and social compassion to the truly vulnerable."

Probably Prebble's strongest political influence came from Norman Douglas (Roger's father and longtime MP for Auckland Central), who hung out at the Queen St headquarters of the Labour Party while Prebble was a law student. Douglas senior enjoyed Prebble's chutzpah and ability to rally the Pacific Island vote — thanks in part to his first wife, Nancy Cocks, a Fijian 17 years his senior with nine children. The couple married in 1973, when Prebble was 25, and the marriage lasted 20 years.

After two years practising law in Fiji, Prebble stood for Auckland Central, beating off National's Murray McCully. When Labour came to power nine years later (1984), he became Minister of Railways and later Associate Minister of Finance with Roger Douglas.

Over the next two years, as they uncovered financial and organisational mayhem, Prebble's politics moved from centralist to the competition model he follows today. "There were 23 different government businesses, 20 per cent of GDP was being poured into them — and they were all operating at a loss. When I was Minister of Railways they were losing $1 million a day. The cost of freight was 100 per cent higher than it is now."

Today, despite Tranz Rail's appalling safety record and Soweto-style stations, Prebble is staunch about the privatisation: "The World Bank consistently says Tranz Rail has the best narrow gauge record in the world ... our transport sector in this country is one of the best in the world."

Clever as ever, what he doesn't mention is the fact that there are only eight other such railways in the contest.

Back in 1987, Prebble's reward was the "poisoned cup" of State Owned Enterprises. Within months he closed 400 post offices and oversaw the sales of Telecom, New Zealand Steel, Petrocorp and Air New Zealand — and along with Douglas became extemely unpopular. Sacked from cabinet by an uncertain and infuriated David Lange in November 1988, he was reinstated as Minister of SOEs two years later by incoming Prime Minister Geoffrey Palmer.

3.30 pm, Katikati: A much quieter meeting. Only towards the end does one man, an earthmoving contractor, attack. "Employees have no say under the ERA ... they turn up for work and get told to go home again ... My kids are working through this system and let me tell you — the employers have their feet on their necks ... It's morally wrong to give a man such a low wage that after 50 hours' work he still has to go cap in hand to the government for money."

But time was running out. Labour lost in 1990. Three years later the electorate Prebble had represented for 18 years turned its back. Ever adaptable, he rejoined the Bar and became an executive director with McConnell International, often working alongside government employees he had shunted into the wider world. "You're looking at the former chairman of the Vietnamese Railway Company."

But the pull of politics was irresistible. Soon after his second marriage to Doreen Kuper, honorary consul to the Solomon Islands, and mother of three (no, he never "gave a moment's thought" to the fact that he has not physically fathered any of his 14 step and foster children) the irrepressible Prebble was back in Parliament, on the right side of the House, leading Act. With Roger Douglas as president, Prebble, spouting a simpler version of the Act message, became its public face. An estimated 300,000 copies of his books, including I've Been Thinking (1996) and I've been Writing (1999), have sold or been given away.

But by 1999 Prebble's image, tarnished by his lurch to the right against a national groundswell to the left, was in trouble. In November, Labour's Marian Hobbs stole his Wellington Central seat by 1482 votes, leaving Prebble a list MP. And although he is where he performs best, as self-appointed leader of the Opposition, Prebble's mandate — to keep Act credible — is formidable. Clark already has him destabilised. His more intellectual-style Act mates seem in danger of deserting him. Both Auckland and Wellington Central electorates have disowned him. There are rumours, this time about dirt on Prebs himself, being assembled. The fight could get even messier.

While insiders such as Labour Party president Bob Harvey liken him to a latterday Hughey Long (the redneck, evangelistic former governor of Louisiana), and others talk about bouts of serious depression in the past when he would disappear for days, Prebble is talking the drubbing well.

"Why do I do it? I think I must like it or I wouldn't. Some meetings I think 'I could give this a miss,' but ..." he smiles.

And, with a tenacity and toughness bred in that brainy vicarage, Prebble keeps hammering his message. "Since 1987 under the ERA we created 87,000 new jobs ... Act is the freedom party, the party of choice, of personal responsibility." His blue gaze is set firmly on the big picture. "I'm determined to see Act forming a significant part of the next government and implementing a real change in the culture of New Zealand.

"We need a society where people do take more responsibility for their actions, people are more entrepreneurial. We've actually got a culture of dependency. People think the government can do everything. And it can't."

4.30 pm, Highway 27, just before the Thames intersection: Prebble, curled up momentarily on a single seat on the bus, stares out at the sodden dairy country, talking on his wellworn cellphone, checking his Palm V organiser. Thinking, always thinking.