Mr Kiwiblog has done a very good post on what Labour must do to win the next election on his Stuff Blog.
I must agree with what he has said.
Geoff standing down is occurring far too early. They must review why they lost and then change the leader.
They must
1) Get rid of the old guard. Keep a few to help the rest but out with the rest. Sadly this election has done the opposite.
2) Move to the centre. Stop attacking popular Blue policies such as National Standards, and three strikes. If the Blues can keep interest free student loans so can you.
3) Do not be held hostage to the unions. Out with 1970's union policies, in with the national standards. Get a membership base which is apart from the unions. All Union members are labour party members, all unions pay money to Labour.
4) Re-build links with buissness. Show that you are buissness friendly. Do not scare away people who are going to vote for you. A rise in the minimum wage is nice but what about losing jobs?.
5) Have a root and branch review, National did this in 2002 and this worked out well.
6) Get a new face, a leader who can connect with the voters. Somebody who was not in when Helen was there. Someone who will be a Natural person like Key.
7) Fight asset sales. Keep up the pressure - 2/3rds of those polled oppose this. Geoff should have announced that they were going to start a Citizens initiated referendum on asset sales. It would have kept the focus on the issue and not let it die. It would have also given Labour the spotlight on this issue and kept it away from the Green's and Winston.
The reds need to tone down scary policies. Like raising the pension age (which must be done) and liberal reforms such as smacking bans. The big scary policy they had was spending. When the country is in recession spending money is no longer cool. People become more conservative. They need to give the impression they will be a steady hand. They need to increase their vote to the 30's or 40's so people will think they will not be run by the Greens.
Labour will be back again (as Muldoon said it is always nice to have Labour in for a term - all the Lino's gone). The thing is how long that will take.
I must agree with what he has said.
Geoff standing down is occurring far too early. They must review why they lost and then change the leader.
They must
1) Get rid of the old guard. Keep a few to help the rest but out with the rest. Sadly this election has done the opposite.
2) Move to the centre. Stop attacking popular Blue policies such as National Standards, and three strikes. If the Blues can keep interest free student loans so can you.
3) Do not be held hostage to the unions. Out with 1970's union policies, in with the national standards. Get a membership base which is apart from the unions. All Union members are labour party members, all unions pay money to Labour.
4) Re-build links with buissness. Show that you are buissness friendly. Do not scare away people who are going to vote for you. A rise in the minimum wage is nice but what about losing jobs?.
5) Have a root and branch review, National did this in 2002 and this worked out well.
6) Get a new face, a leader who can connect with the voters. Somebody who was not in when Helen was there. Someone who will be a Natural person like Key.
7) Fight asset sales. Keep up the pressure - 2/3rds of those polled oppose this. Geoff should have announced that they were going to start a Citizens initiated referendum on asset sales. It would have kept the focus on the issue and not let it die. It would have also given Labour the spotlight on this issue and kept it away from the Green's and Winston.
The reds need to tone down scary policies. Like raising the pension age (which must be done) and liberal reforms such as smacking bans. The big scary policy they had was spending. When the country is in recession spending money is no longer cool. People become more conservative. They need to give the impression they will be a steady hand. They need to increase their vote to the 30's or 40's so people will think they will not be run by the Greens.
Labour will be back again (as Muldoon said it is always nice to have Labour in for a term - all the Lino's gone). The thing is how long that will take.
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