The Govt started the week working hard on its economic programme, with a full Cabinet session at Premier House on Monday plotting the forward strategy. But the World Cup broadcast rights issue, the poor Crown accounts for the year and the ACC blow-out, exposed potentially more dangerous waters the Govt has to navigate first.

The “less than ideal” bidding process over free-to-air telecasts of the next Rugby World Cup led Maori Party co-leader Dr Pita Sharples to accuse Ministers of being “grossly unfair” in their intervention when they offered Govt support to TVNZ and TV3 to outbid the Maori channel. Sharples contended the Govt had leaked details of Maori TV’s bid to TVNZ so it could put in a higher bid, effectively pitting the state broadcasters against each other in a bidding war. John Key changed tack, directing Maori TV be the lead broadcaster in a joint bid. The PM’s intervention restored the mana of Maori TV, and smoothed over relations with the Maori Party. The incident left scars and the Govt needs to understand the friction events of this kind engenders between coalition partners if it is sustained, contains enough fissionable material to provoke an uncontrolled explosion.

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Trans Tasman’s White Paper, “A Road Map For Transforming NZ Inc,” pointed to several of the danger signs for the Govt – pandering to the political needs of MMP coalition partners, and having a Ministerial team with potential holes in it. Jonathan Coleman’s performance as Broadcasting Minister was found wanting this week, and Key’s about face on the Cup TV rights issue took the gloss off his political management skills.

The latest Roy Morgan poll shows the Govt is now back to the peak of its popularity at 57.5%, up 6 points from its last sampling, while Labour sank 5 points to 28%. Few Govts in the MMP era have been able to sustain popularity as long as the Key-led coalition has. But the events of the past week – continuing poor economic news, rejection of potential economy changing tax reforms, cutting ACC entitlements and increasing levies many voters will not understand, and pandering to its Maori Party coalition partner over the TV rights issue – may put a downward spike in its next set of poll numbers. As one sage political observer noted, when a Govt has so many political balls in the air, inevitably one will turn into a hand grenade.

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