The ups and downs of Labour’s first week back in the spotlight

Labour is back in the spotlight, writes Henry Oliver in today’s excerpt from The Bulletin. So how’d their first week go?

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On The Spinoff today,  Lyric Waiwiri-Smith welcomes Labour to the election party . A little late, but arriving with the bluster of someone who wants everyone to know a lot has been happening to them while everyone else has been waiting. For most of this term, she writes, “the image of the Labour Party has largely been that of a person standing next to a dumpster fire sparked by an exploding school lunch or a broken-down ferry and saying, “would you get a load of this guy?” But once you stand next to enough fires, the public starts to ask why you haven’t tried to wield an extinguisher. Criticism alone can’t win an election.”

So what will? A ‘top cop’ high on the list? A slew of new candidates, a few of them younger and more engaging than some of the baggage-ladden Labour personalities too many still associate with lockdowns and QR codes. Now, old Labour is in the process of renewal, of an enlargement of its tent with a “blend of climate activism, justice expertise, business leadership and left-of-left representation.” Still, as discussed yesterday (and more below), Labour’s entrance has been as much of a stumble as a grand arrival. But at least they’re here, trying to figure out the extinguisher.

The mystery of the missing Fieldays tent

Yesterday afternoon,  RNZ’s Russell Palmer first reported  that Labour was missing its Fieldays tent this year after National minister Chris Bishop and Act leader David Seymour both posted photos of an empty patch on social media. “How symbolic. Nothing here. Barren and vacant, like their policies for farmers and rural NZ” Bishop posted. “First we couldn’t find their policies, now we can’t find them at all,” Seymour wrote.

But, party leader Chris Hipkins said they never booked a space to have their tent at the event, a decision made a year ago. So what really happened? The Post’s Stewart Sowman-Lund  tried to get to the bottom of it . National’s Suze Redmayne, MP for Rangitīkei, is adamant the red team’s tent is missing, saying she “heard they cancelled a booking about three weeks ago,”

NZ First’s Jenny Marcroft said she got her information “directly from the organisers of Fieldays.” “That was our site and they moved us over because they told us Labour was a no show.”

Fieldays general manager Brett Beagley told The Post that the organisation is apolitical and won’t be making a comment. Will we ever find out, or will the empty patch of grass remain one of this election’s great mysteries, left for future generations to solve?

Code of conduct

In another Labour ‘’scandal’ that may yet turn out to be an empty patch of grass, questions of impropriety continue to be lobbed back and forth over list candidate and police superintendent Rakesh Naidoo.

Naidoo, the police’s national partnerships manager for ethnic, iwi and communities, was announced at 13th on Labour’s list – essentially a guaranteed seat. Concerns quickly followed about whether he had informed his employer of his intention to seek public office at the “earliest opportunity”, as required by the police code of conduct. On Tuesday, commissioner Richard Chambers  announced a review  covering what information Naidoo had access to in his role, and whether any of it was improperly shared.

Yesterday,  as reported by Adam Pearse in the NZ Herald , two former race relations commissioners backed Naidoo, questioned the political motives behind the review — and its public announcement — and warned the whole affair risks damaging police standing in ethnic communities. “It seems like the minister [Mark Mitchell] and the commissioner have been riding tandem in terms of criticising Rakesh and I deplore that,” said Joris de Bres.

Chambers told the Herald he didn’t want to stand in the way of Naidoo’s political career. “I acknowledge the assurances of others that there was integrity in how this was handled,” he said. “That may indeed be the case. However, I cannot simply take the word of others for that.”

Whether anything comes of this remains to be seen. But every New Zealander following the news now knows his name and face – and for Labour, that’s not nothing.

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