There is another excellent Fran O'Sullivan piece in today's NZ Herald. She has good advice for John Key on brain mouth coordination (a problem which we agree with. The Hive to Key - slow down. Imagine that you are talking to an audience of Americans or English as a second languagers. You are sometimes a bit hard to understand, and by slowing down you will have time to catch yourself if the wrong word begins to slip out).
But what is really interesting is her thesis that Key's greatest ally is Helen Clark (great line Fran!!). It is the Prime Minister's successive political misjudgments which have cost Clark her position as New Zealand's "most preferred prime minister" and sent Labour's own ratings into a death spiral.
Interestingly given our own analysis in recent days Fran points the finger of blame at Mike Williams and Heather Simpson also.
It was Clark's inner circle, particularly her chief of staff Heather Simpson, who combined with the party central to plunder some $800,000 of taxpayers' funds to help Labour win in 2005. Labour was ultimately forced to pay the funds back after a damning auditor-general's report. The party has been on the back foot ever since.
But Clark didn't learn. Her kitchen cabinet then put up the hapless former minister Mark Burton to introduce the obnoxious Electoral Finance Act which the Herald rightly labels "an assault on democracy". It was another politically inept step which will continue to dog Labour right through this election year.
Last week's surreal run of events illustrated just how far she has become detached from the bedrock common sense which characterised her earlier years as prime minister.
Given the above is a leadership change really unthinkable?
It has become a truism in the Wellington beltway that Labour will never roll the woman who has successfully won them three elections. But the Cabinet Ministers who were ruthlessly dispatched by Clark for minor misdeeds and the backbenchers who face the prospect of losing their jobs following an election defeat will make their own calculations.
She then reminds us about the role Cullen played in 1996
In 1996, Michael Cullen - now deputy to Clark - led a deputation asking her to stand down to ensure an orderly leadership transition. Clark refused and went on to triumph in 1999. But that was then and this is now. If Clark's miscalculations continue the odds that she will face a second deputation will increase.
She then looks at Cullen as the potential replacement - instead of Goff
But if Cullen, with his superior management skills, took on a caretaker role the electoral focus would sharpen.
He is the politician Clark sends in to handle the tough jobs when inferior ministers fail. He has defused the foreshore and seabed issue and is now backstopping David Parker whose pig-headedness on climate change issues is paving the way for a major dust-up with New Zealand business.
Importantly, Cullen has Key's measure. This was evident in Parliament where Key sat like a stunned mullet when Cullen took him to task over a newspaper report that quoted the National leader saying "we would love to see wages drop" during a conversation he held in Northland about the gaping wage differences between New Zealand and Australia.
The Hive's view is that Labour will show much more effective political management under a Cullen leadership than a Clark leadership. And while Key is showing the signs of being able to out campaign Clark, we can't say the same about Cullen. Indeed, we suspect that there are many in National who would lose sleep over a successful Cullen leadership bid. We don't think that a Cullen led Labour Party will allow Labour to pull back all their losses but they could get close enough to form a coalition. And in this context we note the far superior relations that Cullen has built up with iwi to those of the Prime Minister. These could just be enough to swing the Maori Party back in Labour's direction.
Watch this space.
