Nicky Rennie: I’m happy to say I voted on the first day polls opened

Advance voting places are now open around Whanganui. Photo / Bevan Conley

OPINION

The fracas that is the general election is well and truly under way.

I’m happy to say I voted on the first day it opened. I’m a firm believer that if you don’t vote, you shouldn’t moan - and I do like the occasional moan, so I always meet them halfway and vote.

The voting conversation is always a tricky one that I liken to a discussion about your salary. There is a bit of an unwritten rule that you don’t have said discussions. Sort of like “I can tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” kind of thing.

When Christopher Luxon was first elected to lead National, I found his approach very refreshing. He wasn’t going to bad-mouth people or other party’s policies; he was going to stick to his knitting and what his party was doing.

Man, has he changed his tune. The debates in all their glory are horrible things to watch as leaders yell each other down and are rude to each other (and in some cases to the person interviewing them).

It gives me an uncomfortable feeling, but the thing that I have noticed the most is it’s made it very difficult for people to make up their minds because while they are bickering and slinging insults, they forget to tell you what their policies are.

In my workplace, I have low-level conversations about the election (while keeping my cards close to my chest) and I can tell you that, at this stage, not one person I have spoken to knows who they are going to vote for because they don’t know enough about the party policies. They can tell you who slung what insult though.

The politicians just come across as unlikeable, so it was interesting that an article popped up on my news feed the other day which said: 10 things you can do to get people to like you.

Something that was also ironic was that there was an ad at the top for one of the top two parties – clearly, they hadn’t read it, but just in case you want to go into politics yourself and catapult yourself to the top of the polls, or you’d just like to garner a few more mates, here are the 10 things:

1. Ask questions.
2. Talk more, not less.
3. Give your time … gratis
4. Listen better.
5. Really and truly care.
6. Admit it, you don’t know everything.
7. Go for the laugh, every time.
8. Lighten up.
9. Don’t be pushy.
10. Admit your weaknesses.

I’ll leave it up to you to decide how many of these qualities our current candidates have, but on the evening of Saturday, October 14, it should become rather obvious.