Kate Hawkesby: Unfortunately for Labour, voters don't care about costings

It’s funny as we get to the sharp end of the election campaign, what exercises people and what doesn’t.

The media are exercised by the Nats tax cut plan. They’re exercised by it largely I assume because the Labour party are exercised about it. And the Labour party are exercised about it because they hate it because it’s popular. It’s seen poll surges for National, and they’ll do anything to try to stem that tide.

Problem is, as the feedback I’ve received this week would attest, and as the polls would suggest too, it is popular. And people seemingly do not care how it’s costed, or what a handful of economists say about it, or how much Grant Robertson bangs on about it being flawed.

The reality is, this government can’t really talk smack about costings to anyone given the state they’re leaving the economy in. They can’t really talk costings when they’re the government who oversaw wasteful spending like we’ve never seen, money poured into mad ideology that went nowhere like bike bridges and light rail, and a general mismanagement of our economy including bloating the public service and taking away targets for anything.

So in a nutshell – bit rich from a government who didn’t even hold themselves accountable on anything, to now throw stones at the opposition. It’s not credible, the criticism is falling on deaf ears. Unless you’re the media of course, who love it and will run with anything this deep in the weeds if the Labour party tells them to.

My point is – it’s of no interest to the average voter. People are looking at the mood, the state of their bank accounts, the state of their mortgages, the state of the country in general, and they’re saying, no thanks. Time for change.

Now, whether they think that change is ACT or the Nats or Winston or any of the other minor parties, that’s an MMP roller-coaster we’ll probably be on for the next few weeks. But the upshot is, it ain’t Labour. So no amount of haranguing Luxon and co over tax cut costings is going to move the needle in my opinion. Too much is going in the wrong direction to turn the truck around now.

I guess attacking all the Nats policies is all they’ve got though – because Labour releasing policy now just looks kind of desperate. Suddenly they’re waking up to a whole bunch of stuff they had six whole years to fix. Suddenly they’re realising we need more doctors, we need better qualified teachers, we need better healthcare, we need more Police, they’re suddenly coming up with policy promises around all these things. It’s just too little too late.

All that time spent naval gazing about how low speed limits should be and how many judder bars to put in, all that time spent wondering how to go easier on criminals, facilitate gang convoys, where to put up more Maori signs, all that time on stuff that in the end got us nowhere and just infuriated everyone. It didn’t advance us economically, or productively, or in terms of our enthusiasm and motivation, it just saw our best and brightest wave ta-ta.

So as frustrating as it must be for Labour and for the media, who are so determined to run the ‘we want costings!’ rhetoric —which by the way they pick and choose when they ask for it, think of all the stuff they’ve not asked for costings on— but as determined as they are about hammering this one, the reality, as the polls suggest, is that voters just don’t care.

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