Goff Phil: General Debates 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Goff Phil: General Debates 
[Sitting date: 15 October 2003. Volume:612;Page:9187. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade) 
: 
 I move  
That the House take note of miscellaneous business 
. In the last 24 hours we have seen the release of two public opinion polls—TVNZ’s Colmar Brunton poll and the  
New Zealand Herald’s 
 DigiPoll. The consistent factor in both those polls is that the National Party has fallen for the second time running. Perhaps it is worth reminding members that just 2 years ago the National Party stood at 40 percent in the polls. It has halved its support in this country at a time when one expects a party in Opposition to make progress. It is 22 percent in the polls. What we are seeing is the death knell of a once great and proud party. 
National’s latest tactic of cosying up to New Zealand First and the ACT party is simply doomed to failure. Richard Prebble described them as the three tenors. The problem is that not only were they not singing in tune but they were not even using the same song sheet. The  
New Zealand Herald 
 was a little bit closer to the bone on that. It described it as the coalition of the unwilling. 
If one looks at this picture it looks like a funeral. The politically terminal Bill English is in the middle of the photo flanked on either side by the gravediggers. The truth is that ACT and New Zealand First are not doing that to save the National Party. They are endeavouring to cannibalise it and that is exactly what is happening. If one looks at what is happening in the polls there is no movement whatsoever towards the centre right. What is happening is that the vote on the centre right is being redistributed. The fact is that the three right-wing parties combined barely score 40 percent in the polls. That is 3 or 5 percent less than the Labour Party on its own. That is the product of 4 nearly 5 years coming up of a Labour Government that has been competent and capable by contrast to the parties on the other side. 
It is said that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts but in this case the whole is less than the sum of the parts. What has happened is that the ordinary New Zealander—the one-time National voter; the mainstream National voter—looks at a picture like that looks at Bill English who is overshadowed on one side by Winston Peters and Richard Prebble on the other side and that is a turn-off to one-time National voters. They remember Winston Peters in Government and his utter inability to work with any other party. They know the Winston Peters of today. He is prepared to appeal to any prejudice in this country however low to try to get votes. They see Richard Prebble the representative of the far right in this country who does not share the values of ordinary New Zealanders and against 66 percent of the population wants to bring nuclear ships back here. He wants to privatise what is left of the public sector and the ordinary New Zealand voter will not have a bar of that at all. 
What is more the people who are supporting New Zealand First and the people who are supporting ACT have totally contradictory attitudes. For ACT supporters who believe in their ideology the thought that Richard Prebble would cosy up to Winston Peters is a turn-off. The people who support Winston Peters seeing him cosy up to Richard Prebble do not want a bar of that. We welcome that policy; it is doomed to failure. 
The other problem of the National Party is that it is led by a failed leader. In 2000 as leader Jenny Shipley scored 14 percent in the polls. Bill English said to his caucus that that woman had to go. Notwithstanding the fact that three times—it is almost biblical—he had proclaimed his loyalty in public he said to his caucus that she had to go. Today Bill English is polling half as preferred Prime Minister as was polled by the person he replaced in 2000. No wonder he has no authority! He sacked poor Maurice Williamson for suggesting he should be on a performance contract and for saying what everybody knew which was that he was failing; he did not have the authority to sack Don Brash. He has no authority.