Brownlee Gerry: General Debate 
Brownlee Gerry: General Debate 
[Volume:662;Page:10325] 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister for Economic Development) 
: 
 What do Rinso Clayton’s the DeLorean Enron Pan American World Airways Ansett Betamax Cold Duck and the Labour Party all have in common? They are all dead brands—all dead brands. They are all disasters in their own kind. And how do we know that the Labour Party is worried about that? Well we have been made aware of the document I have here which is probably from Clare Curran called the Labour Brand Survey. It has been distributed to all Labour members and supporters throughout the country and asks some very important questions: do Labour Party members want to be known as non-confrontational people? Do they want to be known as memorable people? Do they want to be known as retro people? Are they desperate to be known as clever people? No; instead they are choosing “Edgy” “Out there” “Funky” “Fresh” and “Cool”. Well I think that if members have sat on the Labour front bench for 26 years what better descriptions for them are there than edgy out there funky fresh and cool? 
Chris Tremain 
: But not retro—not retro. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: But not retro. The difficulty is working out who wears what because although I would admit that Annette King is cool she is certainly not funky. And I think that it would be an absolute outrage for me to suggest that she is out there. But that is not all. The survey goes on to ask the question on page 2— 
Hon Member 
: Look at this. 
Hon Member 
: It’s Phil. 
Hon Member 
: That’s many years ago. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: That is right. I think that is Phil Goff but I am not sure. It looks more like “Phillipa” Goff. But anyway the survey also goes on to ask members “Can you describe Labour in six or fewer words?”. Well I have to tell this House that I cannot use the word but I think I can come up with one word that has six or fewer letters to describe where Labour is at the moment. 
I will turn now to two lovely pamphlets that the Labour Party is currently circulating around electorates. The pamphlets have inside them some simple silly little questions that Labour is asking the public. On their fronts is a lovely picture of Labour’s current leader. They are the same pamphlets so we would think that they would have the same information but that is except for when it comes to their back pages. On one there is a lovely pohutukawa tree beautiful rolling green hills and a lake in the background. That pamphlet is for electorates like Wellington Central Auckland Central and every other ritzy electorate in the country. But the other pamphlet has dirty old miners’ hats on the back page. That is for the West Coast for Rongotai and for all those hard Labour electorates. 
So here we have a party so hopelessly disorganised with no single brand that does not know whether it is nice tough or naughty or whether it is funky retro or out there. It has no idea on any of that stuff. Just to prove how confused the party is going into his caucus yesterday Mr Goff the Leader of the Opposition—the alternative position to the Prime Minister; the hard man who is supposed to take out the Government—said “Actually I think John Key’s quite good.” He said “I’ve got to give it to him: he is a very good politician very slick very professional at what he does.” Mr Goff stopped just short of saying “I want to vote for him.” but I have to tell the House that that was not far off. 
When we go through this document we see that Labour members are looking for different sorts of branding that they might apply to the party in the months ahead. Well I have found one for them. The brand is on this page. It is “PS”—I presume that is a Labour Party or a left-wing socialist party from some other country around the world—and I think it stands for two things. It has two letters and a picture of a hand outstretched with a rose in it so we are looking here at the postscript for the Labour Party and the rose on its coffin. 
I think it will be very interesting in the next couple of weeks to see how things go because yesterday when it came to the issue of leadership which we all know is on the agenda for Labour Mr Mallard was good and just as he used to be. He was good yesterday and said “No no. We’re not discussing that stuff.” Mr Cunliffe on the other hand said “Oh well this is an important matter and we will be having discussions in caucus.”—statesmanlike and in perfect iambic pentameters too I might say. They are a brand that is dead.