Centenarian must recall what it stands for
When one celebrates one’s 100th birthday, it is customary to do it with some fanfare, not to mention the obligatory telegram from the Queen.
This week, the New Zealand Labour Party celebrates its 100th birthday. You’d barely know it. They’re really not trumpeting it.
Among the socialists and unionists, radicals and moderates who met in Wellington in July 1916 were some who would go on to become great leaders, most notably Michael Joseph Savage and Peter Fraser.
These were men of conviction: One of the principles that united them was opposition to World War I, and Fraser held so strongly to this that he was sentenced to a year’s jail for sedition.
Savage is credited as the father of the welfare state; his mild, bespectacled image still looks down from above some mantelpieces.
Where are these leaders of conviction today? Perhaps the reason the centenary celebrations are so muted is that Labour has nobody who can credibly stand in these shoes. Andrew Little is the fourth leader since the party lost the 1999 election; each leader has shown progressively less ability or willingness to enunciate what it is that distinguishes the party.
This is not a problem unique to NZ Labour. This morning, it appears the Australian Labor Party has fallen short of an election majority and likely consigned itself to another term in opposition. Like NZ Labour, it has had more leaders than defining values. Leader Bill Shorten could now be in trouble.
In the UK, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is hanging on grimly, hoping grassroots and union support can delay his inevitable demise after an extraordinary 172 to 40 no-confidence vote.
Does the international labour movement know what it stands for now? Does NZ Labour know?
At 100, like many centenarians, our Labour Party is looking confused and befuddled. It appears to have forgotten what it stood for.
Under Little, the party that once stood against unthinking imperialism has campaigned to keep the Union Jack on New Zealand’s flag – perhaps keen to safeguard that Royal telegram! The party that once stood for diversity now makes overseas investment policy by tallying up ‘‘Chinesesounding names’’. Little is busy battling off defamation claims, rather than fighting for Labour principles.
Perhaps the warning signs were always there. Back in 1916, socialist radicals privately expressed their doubts. Middle-aged Dunedin gunsmith Arthur McCarthy, himself both an employer and a socialist, wrote: ‘‘The NZ Labour Party has no principles, but a platform merely. It stands, as all political parties must stand, for opportunism only.’’
At the grand old age of 100, has the Labour Party rediscovered some guiding principle beyond the opportunist pursuit of power?