Budget 2023 will be the first big act for Chris Hipkins’ still-fresh premiership and will set the stage for a low-key election in October, without much ‘stardust’ scattered around.
It is looking likely to be a really, really tight campaign. Labour has been gaining ground since Jacinda Ardern’s resignation and is neck and neck with the National Party in polling averages.
The two parties' natural coalition partners, ACT and the Green Party, have been polling at around 10% and 8%, respectively. Not enough for either bloc to command a majority.
On current polling, the election would be decided by Te Pāti Māori. A political party which has partnered with National in the past, but is unlikely to join a coalition that includes ACT.
This puts Hipkins in a surprisingly good position to secure a term as Prime Minister with the support of a broad left-leaning coalition government. And so he doesn’t want to rock the boat.
Oddly, this was a position occupied by an entirely different Chris until very recently.
Christopher Luxon took over leadership of the National Party in late 2021 and, as the NZ public tired of pandemic restrictions and daily crisis briefings, quickly took the lead as the ‘not-Jacinda’ candidate.
The feeling at that time was that the National Party only had to look competent and non-controversial, and anti-Labour sentiment would hand them the election.
But then Ardern resigned, and suddenly there was a new ‘not-Jacinda’ candidate to contend with: Chris Hipkins.
Safest set of hands
Although he was virtually hand picked as her successor, Hipkins has not been afraid to break with the former leader and dramatically reinvent the sixth Labour government.
He has been careful not to directly criticize Ardern, who is still beloved by party members, but has dropped hints in that direction.
Take, for example, his recent pre-Budget speech in which he promised to focus on fiscal restraint and delivering a few priorities well.
“The reality is the Government was previously doing too much, too fast, and the effect of that was being tied up with issues taking time and money away from where our primary focus needed to be,” he said.
Reprioritization work was already underway from December, when Ardern was still leader, but Hipkins has really run with it and made it his own.
Budget 2023 has been pitched as the No Frills Budget and Hipkins as the No Frills Prime Minister. It's not much of a legacy, but the every-man act might win him three years at the top.
While the election campaign might be a close run race, don’t expect it to be packed full of transformative policies and big dreams for the future of the nation.
The interesting policies of this election will come from the minor parties.
An emboldened ACT has been winning public support and will want a prominent voice in any coalition arrangement.
The Green Party co-leaders will negotiate more aggressively than previously, after almost being ousted for not getting enough results over the past six-years.
And, Te Pāti Māori may well be able to name its price — should it find itself the Kingmaker.
Meanwhile, centrists Chris H and Chris L will be competing to be the safest set of hands to see off the last of the pandemic chaos; leaving the project of nation-building to future Prime Ministers.
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