What a way to start the political year.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s resignation caught everyone by surprise, apart from NBR columnist Rachel Smalley who suggested last year the Prime Minister might be gone by Christmas.
Instead, Ardern waited for the Labour Party’s first caucus meeting of 2023 – organised to plan the party’s election year – to announce she was stepping down after a little over five years in the job.
Plenty will be written and speculated about her decision but the Prime Minister’s frank admission she had nothing left in the tank is explanation enough.
It has been an extraordinary time dealing with the horror of the mosque terror attacks in Christchurch, the eruption on White Island, and then a global pandemic, accompanied by an economic crisis. Any one of those issues would have tested a Prime Minister.
For Ardern, as a young female leader, it has also been accompanied by a degree of misogynistic and personal abuse no male leader must tolerate. Former National Prime Minister John Key was subject to personal attacks, but not to the degree faced by Ardern.
Coincidentally Key resigned as Prime Minister rather than face another election, giving in some way, similar reasons as Ardern for going early. In his case he was into his third term as PM.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
Tough job
It is simply a tough job and made tougher when events conspire against governments. In Key’s case, he dealt with the global financial crisis, the Canterbury earthquakes, and the Pike River Mine disaster.
As with Key, Ardern is going quickly.
Labour MPs will meet again on Sunday at Parliament to elect her successor. Under the party’s rules, 66.66% of the MPs have to endorse a new leader for that person to be elected by the caucus. If no candidate can reach that threshold of support then the leadership vote goes out to the wider membership, with caucus having 40% of the total vote, party members 40%, and affiliated unions 20%.
But it seems almost certain Labour MPs will appoint a new leader on Sunday. There would have been plenty of discussions yesterday, which will continue today and Saturday before MPs gather in Wellington on Sunday.
By then, agreement should have been reached on who will replace Ardern as leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister of New Zealand.
Finance Minister Grant Robertson, who contested the leadership twice, the last time in 2014, has ruled himself out of the job.
Presumably two bids to be leader are enough for him, but he too might be feeling the strain of the job and realise, like Ardern, he would not want to face another four years of the intensity that comes with being Prime Minister.
Finance Minister Grant Robertson.
Short-term PM
There is, of course, no guarantee whoever is leader of Labour from this Sunday will get four more years as Prime Minister. Given the polls, it is likely the new leader will have a short-term job only.
But Ardern’s explanation for going now was that she had assessed she could not do another four years and therefore could not commit to being leader beyond the October 14 election. On that basis she had to go now, not wait until the election to resign.
That gives a new leader the best chance to engage with the public and articulate their vision for the country in the not quite nine months to the election.
Who will it be?
The names most mentioned are Education Minister Chris Hipkins and Transport Minister Michael Wood, with Housing Minister Megan Woods and Justice Minister Kiritapu Allan also in the mix. Allan, though, might be a stronger candidate for deputy leader.
All are strong candidates and would likely do a good job, but none are Ardern.
But changing leaders now might give Labour some breathing space, in the sense that Ardern had been the face of the Government’s Covid-19 response. While that had led to an unprecedented single party majority under MMP in 2020, as people became tired of the Covid response they also tired of Ardern.
Education Minister Chris Hipkins is seen as a contender to replace Jacinda Ardern.
Fresh face?
A new leader might be able to present a fresh face on the Government’s post-Covid response phase, even as Covid continues to lurk in the community.
Some commentators suggest Key’s resignation in late 2016 did little to help National, as it failed to form a government after the 2017 election.
Yet National got 44.4% of the party vote in 2017, just shy of its 2008 result and not far below the 47% it won in 2011 and 2014. It only failed to form a government because its likely support parties, particularly Act, did not do well enough.
Labour might be hoping a new leader could help it record a strong enough result – no matter what the polls are saying now – that with the Green Party it could form a third-term government.
The odds, though, are against it and National Party leader Christopher Luxon, who has been gracious in commenting on Ardern’s resignation, must be thankful he will face a tyro leader in the election debates, rather than someone who has done it all before.
While personalities do matter, policies and issues matter more and whoever is leader will still have to deal with the weight of economic problems the country faces. Inflation continues to cause worries and rising interest rates this year will make life even tougher for those households with mortgages.
National Party leader Christopher Luxon
Recession
If the country does slip into recession as many economists think, the Government – and new Prime Minister – face a herculean task in convincing voters they deserve another term.
But that will no longer be a concern for Jacinda Ardern. After five-and-a-bit tough years she will be relaxing and spending more time with her family. Few would begrudge her that.
Brent Edwards is NBR’s political editor.
