It is obvious why Nikki Kaye has been dodging debates with Jacinda Ardern in Auckland Central. She’s terrible at it, as last night’s Backbenchers showed. Kaye came across as an angry finger-wagger who thinks the most important issue in the campaign is to keep wages down for young people. This was in spite of the appearance on the show of of one small business owner who already paid $15 minimum, and a student who was getting the Australian minimum of $21 an hour.
Kaye looked like a politician under pressure. Her polling can’t be that hot. Jacinda Ardern, Labour’s spokesperson on youth affairs, was forward-looking and articulate, and had all the best lines of the night as well. Kaye said the holiday highway was to help the poor; Ardern asked how making it easier for Aucklanders to get to their baches was going to help the poor! The show’s worth a look when it comes up on the TVNZ site; it gives a glimpse of what the future could be like. The Greens’ Denise Roche was also impressive.
Aucklanders tell me Kaye is well known as a ‘cushion politician’; one who agrees with the last person that sat on them. She decries mining on Barrier but happy to have it going ahead on Coromandel and talks trams, happy in the knowledge her party bosses talk roads. There was an example of this last night – Kaye favoured the rail loop last night, confident that Joyce will veto it.
No wonder Nikki Kaye is being represented at debates by a chicken. Auckland Central could be a very interesting contest. Ardern’s a buy.
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