{"id":11921,"date":"2026-04-10T20:09:59","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T08:09:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/?p=11921"},"modified":"2026-04-13T16:52:03","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T04:52:03","slug":"luxon-still-hasnt-got-the-hang-of-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/?p=11921","title":{"rendered":"\u00a0Luxon still hasn\u2019t got the hang of politics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

OPINION: Karl du Fresne<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to play that game,\u201d Christopher Luxon said \u2013 rather lamely \u2013 when Tova O\u2019Brien asked him how many Maori National MPs were in his cabinet.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a game,\u201d countered O\u2019Brien, doubtless trying hard to conceal her glee at having so easily caught the prime minister out.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh, but it <\/strong>is <\/em><\/strong>a game. The game is called scalp-hunting and it\u2019s commonly practised by journalists and broadcasters who mistakenly think their role is to make politicians squirm.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The funny thing is, no one can recall the game being played when Jacinda Ardern was PM. Ardern appeared to be surrounded by an invisible but impenetrable shield that protected her against awkward questions.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t so much that such questions harmlessly bounced off her. They just weren\u2019t asked. And if they were, as happened sometimes on Mike Hosking\u2019s breakfast programme, her response was to stop going on his show.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

O\u2019Brien would have been thrilled at causing Luxon to stumble yesterday when he couldn\u2019t answer her question. It was the equivalent of a bowler stumping the opposing team\u2019s opening batsman with the first ball. You could almost see the thought bubble above her head: \u201cHowzat!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luxon should have seen it coming. O\u2019Brien has built her reputation on hatchet jobs and would have been eager to make an impact in her new role as presenter of TVNZ\u2019s breakfast show. The hapless PM obliged by walking straight into her trap.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then he compounded his mistake by saying that the newly promoted James Meager, who is of Ngai Tahu descent, is a cabinet member when he\u2019s actually a minister outside cabinet. O\u2019Brien pounced again and left Luxon looking like a possum in the headlights.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was depressing evidence that even after four and a half years as leader of the National Party and two and a half as prime minister, Luxon still hasn\u2019t got the hang of politics.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

His rise to the top of the corporate ladder was no preparation for the shark tank he now swims in. He still exhibits two fatal frailties: he lacks a killer instinct and he\u2019s far too keen to be liked. Those are dangerous political weaknesses that leave him vulnerable and make him an easy target for aggressive broadcasters and journalists, to say nothing of his political opponents.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Far from developing the agile – and sometimes necessarily forceful – verbal and mental responses essential in his position, he appears to rely on stilted, formulaic talking points supplied to him by his communications advisers. Not only do these not resonate with the public, but rigid adherence to them leaves him exposed and floundering when an unexpected question lands.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A more street-smart politician would have known how to deal with O\u2019Brien\u2019s mischievous query (and it <\/strong>was<\/em><\/strong> mischievous, since its clear purpose was not to enlighten viewers so much as to catch Luxon out).<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, it might be argued that Luxon should know how many Maori National MPs are in his cabinet. But his response should have been that the ethnicity of cabinet ministers is irrelevant. It’s competence that matters.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said he wasn\u2019t going to play O\u2019Brien\u2019s game, but he did. Rather than feebly protesting at her question, he should have gone on the front foot and challenged her attempt to reduce cabinet appointments to a matter of identity politics. Luxon and his ministers need to constantly remind themselves that one of the reasons New Zealanders so emphatically rejected Labour at the last election was that they were desperate to be extricated from that ideological morass.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all his faults (and God knows, there are plenty), Winston Peters wouldn\u2019t have given O\u2019Brien the satisfaction of claiming his scalp. That\u2019s the difference between the two coalition party leaders, right there: Peters is a born politician whereas Luxon is still on trainer wheels.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Karl du Fresne writes at Karl du Fresne<\/u><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OPINION: Karl du Fresne \u201cI\u2019m not going to play that game,\u201d Christopher Luxon said \u2013 rather lamely \u2013 when Tova O\u2019Brien asked him how many Maori National MPs were in his cabinet. \u201cIt\u2019s not a game,\u201d countered O\u2019Brien, doubtless trying hard to conceal her glee at having so easily caught the prime minister out. Oh,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11922,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[225,113,255,1009],"coauthors":[921],"class_list":{"0":"post-11921","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-opinion","8":"tag-christopher-luxon","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-opinion","11":"tag-tovah-obrien"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11921"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11921\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11923,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11921\/revisions\/11923"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11921"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=11921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}