Twenty-Five years on, Winston Peters remains undisputed Chief

New Zealand First Party marks its Silver Jubilee this week
Sam Sachdeva
Wellington, July 20, 2018
This week marks the 25th anniversary of New Zealand First, a Party which has had three stints in power under Winston Peters. The Party has survived personality clashes, sackings and a stint in the political wilderness – but where does it go next?
In July 1993, Winston Peters stood in front of a crowd at Auckland’s Alexandra Park Raceway to announce the formation of a new political Party.
No candidates were named, no policy specifics revealed, but there was a name: New Zealand First.
Twenty-five years later, Peters is the Deputy Prime Minister for a second time, in the Party’s third stint in government.
It has survived clashes of egos, sackings and resignations, and a three-year stint in the political wilderness – but where does it go next?
NZ First or Winston First?
Speaking to Newsroom, Peters said that the years have flown by, with the Party’s members and officials working hard to overcome “enormous activity and a lot of difficulty.”
“We have got people who have worked for us for the full 25 years – now their sons and daughters are working.”
Api Dawson, a former Director ff Operations for New Zealand First who worked with the Party for over a decade, says that the Party’s 25th anniversary is particularly impressive given it fell out of Parliament in 2008 following the Owen Glenn donation scandal.
“To hold things together for those three years then come back together [at the 2011 election], it’s remarkable.”
Impressive milestone
Peters puts New Zealand First’s longevity down to the fact that it has kept the promise in its name, “putting our country first”.
“There’s a certain element of the population that would vote for him even if he was strangling puppies – they would say the puppies deserved it.”
However, it’s obvious to most where the real secret to the Party’s appeal lies.
Dawson said there is “no other component or ingredient” to its success other than Peters himself, using an analogy reminiscent of Donald Trump’s brag he could “stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody” without losing votes.
“There’s a certain element of the population that would vote for him even if he was strangling puppies – they’d say the puppies deserved it.”
Tuariki Delamere, who was among 17 MPs in the Party’s class of 1996, believes there is no other politician in New Zealand history close when it comes to the intensity of Peters’ appeal to voters.
Loyalty to Winston
“It’s not loyalty to New Zealand First – it’s loyalty to Winston.”
Peters’ strength, Dawson said, is that he is one of the few people in New Zealand politics who genuinely enjoys the rigours of an election campaign.
A former New Zealand First staffer, who did not want to be named, also acknowledges Peters’ “good strategic brain,” adding that he has, for better and worse, exerted total control over the Party since its inception.
“He is a micromanager simply because I think he has learned that is the way things work best for him – no one makes decisions but Winston.”
Dawson describes the Party’s philosophy as “conservative economic nationalism,” a grab bag of ideas from both the left and the right.
Some have called Peters the last of the ‘Muldoonists,’ while the man himself says the Party advocates for “responsible capitalism, capitalism with a human face.”
However you care to describe the Party’s ideology, it is clear that it has changed little in 25 years.
Strong advocacies
As the former staffer says, Peters has succeeded not only because of his charisma but because he’s “stuck to his knitting: advocating for seniors, railing against foreign ownership, calling for immigration cuts, and bashing big corporates.”
While Peters is New Zealand First’s biggest asset, Dawson said that he is also the Party’s weakest link as it seeks to bring new members into the fold.
“One of the main barriers to vote growth for New Zealand First is Winston: basically all the voters know Winston, there is no name recognition problem, and all those voters … have a strong opinion of him either way, so there is not much chance of bringing much more people over to the cause.”
A new face could bring in new voters, Dawson said, although some Winston loyalists could drop off as a result.
Delamere is less optimistic, believing the Party is gone once Peters is, and he’s not alone in that view.
No one-man band – Peters
Unsurprisingly, Peters rejects any suggestion that the Party is a one-man band, pointing to events organised by Party officials around the country, including in Southland this week.
“That is what makes a political Party, no one person can do that, and we have that capacity all over the country, and we still do pack the halls – we do not get the publicity of other parties but we get the real barometer test of whether there is consumer demand for the product that we have in politics.”
The key issue for any post-Peters Party would be which leader it chooses.
Possible Successors
The obvious candidates include the ever-colourful Shane Jones, charged with dispensing the Government’s billion-dollar regional fund, and New Zealand First deputy Fletcher Tabuteau, who has been a member of the Party since its creation.
Former deputies Ron Mark and Tracey Martin may also have designs on the top job, but most feel that nobody in the current caucus can quite fill Peters’ shoes.
“I don’t see anyone there at the moment that can do what Winston is able to do – he might be a one-off in New Zealand history,” the former staffer said.
Of course, making it past the 2020 election – even with Peters – is no given.
Performance at Polls
The Party has never made it past one-term in government, and has generally won between four and nine percent of the vote for most of its existence (its high point remains the first MMP election in 1996, at 13.35%).
With a “base” of between two-and-a-half to three percent, Dawson said, Peters and his team rely on peeling off voters from elsewhere – hence the usual dance about which Party it will go with after the election.
Despite seemingly tethering himself to a young Labour government, Peters could still go with National at the next election if circumstances made it the right decision, Dawson said.
While Peters said that he has not yet decided his plans beyond this term, both Dawson and the former New Zealand First staffer believe that he will contest the 2020 election.
“Winston loves Parliament, he loves politics, and he is in good health as well … there is no reason for him to give up politics at the moment so he simply won’t,” Dawson said.
Political Longevity
The Deputy Prime Minister has recently taken to citing the electoral success of new Malaysian Prime Minister, 93-year-old Mahatir Mohamad, as a sign of the benefits of political longevity.
Does that mean we should expect a 98-year-old Peters to be leading New Zealand First into its 50th anniversary celebrations?
“No … it is just me trying to encourage you guys not to be so ageist.”
Peters has thought about a life beyond politics – “of course I have” – but said that he is for now “seriously absorbed in the job and the challenges I face now.”
Changing Party Constitution
The Party is replacing one ageing body this year: its Constitution, which Peters said, will be formally updated at its AGM in September to reflect the changes in the last 25 years.
“You have got to start at the ground floor, and the ground floor for this Party is to modernise our Constitution in line with the latest technology that is available, so that is critical.”
While the changes are largely about administrative issues, Peters said that they will raise wider implications in terms of the Party’s shape and structure.
“The work we are doing now, we will be in better shape by December this year than we have been for an awfully long time, and in a modern context.”
How the Party shapes up in the coming years will require far more work.
Sam Sachdeva is Foreign Affairs and Trade Editor of Newsroom, an independent, New Zealand-based news and current affairs site, founded by Mark Jennings, former Head of News and Current Affairs at Mediaworks (TV3) and Tim Murphy, former Editor-in-Chief of the New Zealand Herald. Newsroom is powered by the generosity of people who support its mission to produce fearless, independent and provocative journalism. Indian Newslink has published the above Report and Picture under a Special Agreement with www.newsroom.co.nz
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Picture of Winston Peters by Lynn Grieveson