Labour’s campaign review

Someone in Labour leaked a copy of their campaign review to 3 News. It is online here.

Some of their conclusions are stark:

In general, Labour’s campaign preparation was inadequate.

Perceptions of tension around the leadership and disunity within caucus seriously undermined Labour’s credibility with voters and frustrated any attempt to present a Party that was ready for government.

Labour did not present a coherent and convincing image of itself or its policies. There was a general lack of message discipline, and the policies put forward at the election were often complex, difficult to understand and easily misrepresented by our opponents.

• It is imperative that Labour acts – and is seen to act as a disciplined and coherent team that is ready for government if it is to win the trust of voters in 2017. As a key element of this process, the senior leadership team within Caucus should be given greater prominence and responsibility throughout the three years.
• Great care should be taken in deciding when and which policies should be put before the public, and the language that should be used to explain them.

The first one is the leader should stop hogging all the limelight. The second seems to suggest that some of their policies will be kept secret form the public!

• Labour has still to define positively and confidently convincing, alternative macro-economic policies, which also respond to wider social and environmental issues,despite emerging international challenges to neo-liberal orthodoxy

This sounds like a Bryan Gould point – railing against neoliberalism, despite the fact we do not have anything close to a neoliberal Government.

• All electorate candidates should also nominate for the list to ensure that candidates campaign for both the electorate and the Party. It was apparent in the last election that some electorate candidates did not campaign for the Party vote.

Such as Clayton Cosgrove, who ironically is a List MP!

Patrick Leyland looks at the review, and is unimpressed with it.

At the end of the day this review is a mess. However the biggest problem will be if the party focusses on the guff in it (I can already imagine the fights that changes to LEC and regional council rules will cause) and continues to ignore the very real political problems it faces – which remain largely unaddressed.

Given this review is a waste of the envelope it was written on, it will be interesting to see how the new leader and president react

Also of interest is Richard Harman at Politik:

Another major Labour Party document has apparently come as a surprise to Leader Andrew Little.

The review of the Election Report was leaked on Wednesday afternoon to Radio New Zealand.

But even though the report was obviously finished,  POLITIK understands it was not made available to the Leader’s office until after it had been leaked.

So the media got hold of the review before the Leader!!