Rodney Hide: Labour's answer? Let MPs choose

Labour is boxing itself in too far from NZ's political centre. Photo / Mark Mitchell

What sort of person is a member of the Labour Party? Or a union boss? I have no idea. But I do know they aren't the people whose vote Labour needs.

And that's Labour's problem. The leadership aspirants are pitching to the wrong audience. The Labour membership has a 40 per cent say in choosing the new leader. The unions 20 per cent. And the caucus the remaining 40 percent.

That alone is off-putting to Mr and Mrs Centre-Voter. They don't like union bosses. And their politics aren't those of the Labour Party.

Labour's problem is the people who were voting Labour but are now voting National.

The difficulty is that in pitching to party members and union bosses the leadership contenders are turning these voters off.

That's the advantage of the caucus choosing the leader. The MPs' electorates are Mr and Mrs Centre-Voter. And list MPs meet a greater cross-section of people than do party members and union bosses. By their responsibilities, MPs are best placed to know what voters want. They should choose the leader.

Labour is boxing itself in too far from New Zealand's political centre. That centre is where the power resides. To win the centre is to win power.

Labour attacks John Key as some secret right-wing ideologue. He isn't. And voters know it.

They would be better attacking him for having no ideas other than those Helen Clark bequeathed. The attack has the advantage that it's true.

Their attack line could well be "Vote the real thing, Vote Labour". To win, Key has occupied the precise place in politics that Clark occupied. Labour must win that place back, not drift ever-more left. A caucus vote also has the great merit of being quick. Choosing a leader is brutal and bruising. Far better it be done quickly and behind closed doors.

What has already spilled out publicly is damaging. It's difficult to see Labour MPs working together after slagging each other publicly.

The public process of choosing a new leader makes Labour appear an ill-disciplined rabble concerned only with themselves and not the aspirations and concerns of voters.

Our Parliamentary system relies on a strong opposition. National is setting the agenda, determining our response to the Islamic State and discussing new anti-terror laws.

The Opposition is squabbling. That's not good for any of us. .

Key knows exactly whose vote he needs to win power. The next Labour leader must bring the same focus and the politics to wrest back that vote. Let's hope the seventh, or eighth, Labour leader to go up against Key has the right stuff.