– Nick Kelly
So-called ‘from the left’ political commentator Chris Trotter posed the following question to his post election column in the Sunday Star times:
“What led the majority of the New Zealand electorate to reject a government that has not only done it no great harm but might even be said to have done it some good?”
The answer according to Trotter is this:
Last night’s result was manufactured out of the besetting sin of the last 150 years of western history – the crisis of masculinity. What, exactly, is a man in a world of corporate and public bureaucracies?
It was these: the men who just couldn’t cope with the idea of being led by an intelligent, idealistic, free-spirited woman; the gutless, witless, passionless creatures of the barbecue-pit and the sports bar (and the feckless females who put up with them); who voted Helen Clark out of office
John Key – you’re welcome to them.
If the NZ public were so anti having a Labour woman prime minister for the reasons Trotter outlined, then why did they re elect her three times?
Left: Young workers, led by Unite union protesting against youth rates under Labour.
Helen Clark has been the leader of the Labour Party since 1993, and in that time has won three out of five of the last elections. The last 9 years has been the longest time the NZ Labour Party have held power since the end of the second world war. As the Workers Party booklet The Truth about Labour has documented, the last 9 years of Labour government has not been a “worker- friendly” government. The 100 wealthiest New Zealanders have increased their wealth by over 300% under Labour according to the NBR rich list, while workers wages remain abysmal.
Labour did virtually nothing to reverse the attacks on workers by the previous National administration, or those carried out by the fourth Labour government.
The reality is that voters rejected Labour after a decade of them not delivering.
For real analysis of the New Zealand political situation, forget about Trotter’s nonsense – read the Spark instead.
YES!!!!!!!! Labour [DID ] virtually nothing to reverse the attacks on workers [& OR POOR BENEFICARIES] by the previous National administration, or those carried out by the fourth Labour government.
[Helen ISH CLARK REFUSED BENEFIICIARES A LOUSY $20 per week rise , WHILE SHE EARNED recently roughly $8000 per week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HELL-ISH CLARK …….gave the beneficies and poor worker her HELLENISH-CLARK Smacking routine.NOW the VOTERS have smacked her with their VOTES RIGHT out of her JOB.
The reality is that voters rejected Labour after a decade of them not delivering.