Collins labours to get under rival’s skin
Jacinda Ardern lost the first leaders’ debate but Judith Collins didn’t win it. Collins proved her worth to National tonight: it is unlikely she lost any votes.
Ardern, for her part, a now hardened political professional, seemed determined to avoid creating a viral internet meme out of the night. If that were the intent, she achieved it.
Collins came out with nothing to lose: swinging, heckling, interrupting and taking the fight to the Labour leader. In response, Ardern largely stuck to her talking points, emoted and generally reflected Labour’s riskaverse campaign.
Collins could barely disguise her contempt for the Labour leader: scoffing, rolling her eyes, going after the PM on doing down farmers, leaving kids in poverty and taxing middle New Zealand too much.
Ardern, in response, seemed to regard Collins as something akin to an irascible aunt. Mostly ignoring her, sometimes politely arguing back.
In her closing statement, she led off with the three big disasters faced on her watch,
before ending with Labour’s slogan: let’s get moving.
It’s not clear many voters would have changed their mind as a result of this lacklustre debate, dominated by Breakfast host John Campbell.
The tactic from Collins seems to be to try to get under Ardern’s skin, while Ardern seemed to be trying to be relentlessly optimistic and nice – presumably to draw a contrast between the two. She consistently hewed back to Labour talking points.
Both leaders fell back to entrenched positions and didn’t answer a lot of questions.
This is more of a risk for Ardern, whose trademark is authenticity. She appeared both flat and unusually unenthusiastic. She was at her most confident and specific talking about climate change.
That said, the first debate is always the incumbent’s to lose.
It was the first big head-to-head outing for Collins. Although she had faced off against Ardern in Parliament, the intimate nature of the one-on-one debate is different.
It was an opportunity for Collins to show her wares: it was the first time she got to stand with the prime minister on equal billing outside of Parliament.
In past elections, the Opposition leader has done well in the first debate for this reason alone.
Just before the debate, the latest
1News/Colmar Brunton poll came out showing Labour pulling back to 48 per cent but National also falling to 31 per cent compared to the same poll.
All things considered, this is not a disaster for National, but it will be if it doesn’t rise. It was good news for the Greens and ACT on 6 per cent and 7 per cent respectively. If these numbers were replicated on the night, Labour could govern alone.
Remarkably, even inexplicably,
Covid-19 was barely mentioned in the debate, even by Ardern.