Living on a Prayer - the Twilight of Fifth Labour Government

Living on a Prayer: The Twilight of the Fifth Labour Government

by Fernando Henriquez

Dissertation submitted in Partial Fulfillment of a Bachelor of Arts with Honours

Word Count (excluding tables): 15382

Fernando Henriquez
40 minutes ago
Dissertation due tomorrow. Only starting now. Challenge accepted.
 
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Abstract

On present polling, it is looking likely that the incumbent Fifth-Labour Government led by Prime Minister Michael Cullen will finally come to an end after 12 years of having dominated the landscape. This dissertation aims to explore the lifespan of the final years of the Labour government in the 2008-2011 period as they struggled to maintain a fractious unity with no less than 5 other coalition partners. The timespan ranges from the 2008 Election all the way to the last sitting day of this parliament. This dissertation is not comprehensive by any stretch of the imagination as I have opted to keep focus on the big events and affairs which I believed defined this government and it's achievements rather than trying to cover every single detail.


As Fernando hurriedly shat out the abstract on the page, meaningless jargonistic words spilling out at light speed, he reflected how this had come to pass that he was only writing his dissertation a day before the submission date.

He had come to the University of Otago with such high hopes merely 3 years ago. But he was never a bright or particularly hard-working student, what he was good at was weaseling into things. He'd bluffed his way into a scholarship program for "Leaders of Tomorrow" by detailing, in gory detail, his ambitions to be Prime Minister. His first year was a haze of political activity, alcohol and freedom. His second year was a haze of more politics, more alcohol and for the first time in his life - a girlfriend. His third and final year he had weaseled into an honours program by taking advantage of an administrative error. And now he was reaping what he sowed.

Henriquez didn't really have the patience or methodology required to be a sound and competent academic. What he was good at was campaigning and winning elections, or so he flattered himself. He'd run five consecutive times for his student government, losing three out of five. These campaigns probably had something to do with his poor academic performance - in fact he'd spent the last week it was due campaigning to get re-elected to the student executive, perhaps made insecure by the knowledge that he was only re-elected by 9 votes the last time.


"Fuck, fuck fuck. I need to focus. Focus. "
 
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I like the idea of a TL on this, but is that what this is, or is this a celebration of the completion of your thesis?

It's basically an alternate history where I wrote a different dissertation because Labour got re-elected.

It will take the form of extracts from a fake dissertation as well as vignettes and flashbacks from Fernando as he explains how it came to pass that he's writing his dissertation only a day before it's due.
 
It's basically an alternate history where I wrote a different dissertation because Labour got re-elected.

It will take the form of extracts from a fake dissertation as well as vignettes and flashbacks from Fernando as he explains how it came to pass that he's writing his dissertation only a day before it's due.

Ahh!

Well carry on then. I look forward to seeing this.

How are you going to explain the 2008 election? Is it similar to OTL, but with a Labour coalition? NZ First gets into parliament I guess but ACT doesn't?
 
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