“Once we start saying society is the problem, that means no-one has any personal responsibility.”
Judith Collins (2010-2015)
It will come as no surprise to know that I will, this week, be treading a very fine line in detailing the rise and fall of the Sixth National Government. That said, how could I resist using one of Collins’ interminable quotes about personal responsibility? If the irony of Brash talking about ‘one people’ is bitterly funny, Collins talking about personal responsibility is a laugh riot.
It’s a rather cringeworthy pun to say her leadership got off to a shaky start with the Christchurch earthquakes and, to be honest, I think the two essential themes of the Collins Ministry, those of scandal and survival, were better shown by the Passport Scandal shortly before the first quake.
Shortly after the election, it emerged that the Freedom Party’s leader – hitherto notable mostly for his mournful moustache and porcupine haircut – had stolen the identity of a dead child to get a fake passport. It was a bad look for anyone, but it was a career-ender for a law-and-order politician like the Deputy PM and an apparent PR disaster for the Government itself.
But it was in precisely this kind of scandal that Collins proved her worth as a leader and epitomised those two major themes: a major scandal or crisis would arise and threaten the stability of the government, the Prime Minister would very publicly strike off the individual responsible, distancing herself from them all the while, and the Opposition would see its efforts to gain political capital by attacking the Prime Minister frustrated by her own pre-emptive moves to preserve the image of the leader running a tight ship and keeping her crew on the straight and narrow. The Freedom caucus had a bloodless coup, National strengthened its grip on the direction of the Government, and Collins came out smelling like roses, just in time for September 4.
This pattern played out in a dozen other scandals, with the most masterful display of Collins’ ability to turn weakness into strength – and strength into a cudgel – coming when the Minister of Justice was accused of making unwanted sexual advances. As usual Collins fired the guilty party and acted tough, but it was her follow up, where she shamelessly cribbed notes from Labour’s script on women’s rights in her public statements on the matter of sexual harassment, which was the real stroke of genius. In one fell swoop, the Prime Minister reassured her supporters, secured the approval of voters ever-paranoid of dodgy politicians, and won stunned plaudits from her mortal enemies on the left for being an unlikely progressive icon.
This skill in handling disasters, and the public relations offensive after the 2011 earthquake portraying Collins as the great overseer of the project to rebuild Christchurch and the economy, meant that for a good two or three years Collins was the first Prime Minister since Talboys to hold the support of New Zealanders on the centre-left and centre-right alike, with her image as the woman cleaning the skeletons out of the government’s closet obfuscating the fact that it was her party that was responsible for most of them.
But it would be incredibly naïve to call Judith a Talboysian moderate. Collins’ image as the arbiter of justice included a hard line on law and order, which saw punitive action taken against boy racers, recidivist criminals, drug addicts, dole bludgers, benefit fraudsters, gangs, bikies, deadbeat parents, fighting in schools, underage drinking, and smoking in prisons. All of this only helped her image, with the emphasis on the individual’s responsibility for their own actions helping New Zealanders feel safer as well as – more importantly – superior to the grimier elements of society.
But even with Collins’ crushing re-election victory, strengthening National’s grip on power as the Greens failed to return to Parliament thanks to three thousand or so votes, the good times would come to an end. While Collins responded extremely well to scandal, the big names just kept on coming: a Cabinet colleague of the sex pest Justice Minister caught with his fingers in the till, a weatherman-turned-backbencher aligned with Collins found quite literally gambling away his dying mother’s money, assault charges filed against the MP for Northland (and withdrawn after a hush money settlement), an MP at the other end of the country bugged his own electorate and Parliament offices – the list went on.
And then the Vivakai scandal hit.
This isn’t the place to rehash the entire debacle, not with half of it still in the courts. What can be said with confidence after two years is that Collins’ biggest misstep was her unusually tame response; if she had simply sacked Morrie Williamson instead of putting him “on notice,” the media would have lost interest in short order. But questions went unanswered, and before long it was rumoured that he knew something the PM didn’t want made public.
Just how Williamson came to know of Collins’ interactions with the head of the import-export firm, including during a state visit to China, is quite the mystery, but a crack finally appeared in the façade of the Iron Maiden during a post-Cabinet press briefing where she took an angry swing at the media. While this wasn’t surprising in itself, it set journalists to wondering, and before long diligent investigations turned up quiet meetings, big donations, and bizarre irregularities in the accounts of her husband’s businesses.
The old scandal playbook was pulled out, but it quickly became apparent that this one was not going to go away in a hurry. By early 2015 it was a question of when, not if, and it’s still remarkable that she clung on until most of her Cabinet presented her an ultimatum and, rather than subject the party to a repeat of the Peters saga, she resigned the leadership in a rush and in disgrace.
Overall, Collins’ tenure serves as an important reminder of the fact that modern politics is at least as much about image as actual achievements or beliefs. Once Collins had established the image of a no-nonsense boss overseeing a responsible, well-run government, it didn’t matter if there were scandals because Judith would sort it out. And without wanting to rearrange facts after the event, I maintain that this was key to the Sixth National Government’s success, even more than Labour’s impotence. Once National had secured a reputation as an effective government who demonstrated their honesty by cracking down on crime, the scandals and by-elections didn’t matter to the man on the street, because
that didn’t fit with the National he knew.
This shows the power of a government to control the narrative around its actions and the danger inherent to that, and it’s why Judith was right, in a sense: it’s fashionable to blame society for electing a bad government, but there’s a place for personal responsibility as we address the rot in our politics. It falls to the voter to choose a government which will run the country with transparency and as much honesty as can reasonably be expected.
On Collins, it’s hard to give a conclusive ending, as her story continues to be written. I will simply note that Mrs Collins returned to Parliament in the last election with an increased majority in her electorate, and her name has been floated as a contender for the next leadership stoush. Whatever comes next, it should be worth the watch.