National's leader Christopher Luxon and deputy leader Nicola Willis Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
National Party leader Christopher Luxon, having ruled out working with Brian Tamaki's Freedoms NZ Party, says Labour's focus on the topic is a distraction.
Luxon last Tuesday refused to rule out working with Freedoms NZ after Destiny Church leader Tamaki led a protest of about 2000 people to Parliament and announced the party.
The National leader has previously refused to comment about coalition arrangements with likely partner ACT, and seemed to be relying on that same policy - but after more than a week, and some vociferous criticism from commentators and political opponents alike, he relented.
"I don't think it's a big surprise, when you go back and look at my comments when the questions were first raised with me that was 'I just don't think they're going to make it, I don't agree with anything they say, there's nothing in common'," he told reporters this afternoon.
"If you want me to rule it out I'm happy to do that, but what the issue is I'm not interested in playing a parlour game of rule-in, rule-out - a beltway game about what we think of other coalition arrangements at this point in time."
Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson gave a speech in the House yesterday criticising the move, saying it was a game the media liked to play and was sometimes difficult, but when it came to Tamaki, Luxon could not answer.
"Did he not take the clue of the so-called people's court that took place outside Parliament where Mr Luxon, among other people, was convicted of crimes against humanity?," Robertson asked.
"Apparently, no. Now, this question was so easy David Seymour got it right - that's how easy the question was - but no, Christopher Luxon ploughed on, he doubled down, he said he wouldn't rule it out.
He put the stance down to Luxon's principles.
"We know exactly what that means, Mr Luxon will do anything whatsoever, he'll compromise any value - he doesn't care. Once again, we see the impact of his political inexperience."
Grant Robertson Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Luxon cast Robertson's attacks as a distraction.
"If you want to follow the squirrel and the distraction and the deflection from Grant Robertson feel free. That's what happens each and every week, it's just part of the game that they have to do in order to deflect from their utter incompetence.
"They want to create a distraction and a deflection from the fact that they're performing incredibly poorly, the whole country's going backwards ... I fully understand, yep, every week there's going to be a story to try and deflect and distract from what's going on but Kiwis see through it, they understand what's going on."
Labour MP Willie Jackson speculated a different source to Luxon's delay in making his coalition intentions with Tamaki, or lack thereof, clear.
"I think he was considering it very much but, you know, they realised that it wasn't going their way. There's no doubt he was considering it but in the end I think the numbers weren't falling their way."
He suggested Luxon had been considering the levels of support Tamaki's party could attract, given the self-proclaimed apostle had claimed to have aligned himself with several other groups, including some which were heavily involved in the more protracted and violent occupation of Parliament's grounds in February.
"That's what he was probably looking, who were the allies with Brian, you see, because it wasn't just him. There were a lot of groups there, some of those groups were getting 2 to 3 percent.
"So he was probably looking at that and then, when he realised Brian probably didn't have the support that he was saying he had, it was probably time to walk away."
Another Labour MP, Kiri Allan, said Luxon should have rejected Tamaki long ago.
"I'm disappointed it's taken this long, it was an absolute ridiculous proposition that they legitimately entertained working with Brian Tamaki in the first instance."
But National's deputy leader and finance spokesperson Nicola Willis backed Luxon's stance, saying it was no surprise.
"I obviously have a lot of private conversations with Chris Luxon and I can tell you nothing he said today surprised me, his views on Brian Tamaki have been clear to me for a long time.
"He doesn't want to work with Brian Tamaki, he's never wanted to work with Brian Tamaki, at the same time he doesn't want to engage with the parlour game of ruling people in and out when we're still more than a year from an election."
She jumped onto Luxon's distraction bandwagon too, saying Robertson's speech had been made out of desperation.
"One big distraction technique - he was absolutely ashamed yesterday. He tried to sneak in a tax to put more money in his coffers, he grabbed it from New Zealanders, he got caught red-handed and so he mounted a massive distraction campaign."
She was referring there to the government's own about-face yesterday, when Labour pulled the plug on a proposal to apply GST to all KiwiSaver fees.
Luxon's criticism of that reversal at the time bore a passing resemblance to Robertson's attacks: each saying the other could not stick to their principles, and could not be trusted.
Heading into the House again this afternoon, Robertson said his speech was not a distraction.
"No. I think it is very important that New Zealanders are clear that the dangerous extremism that Brian Tamaki represents has no place in this Parliament, it took Mr Luxon eight days to decide that but I'm glad that he finally did.
He said his speech had been very serious and sincere.
"I hope that came across ... I enjoy the general debate for a bit of humour and levity, I think you would have seen how I ended that speech and I am genuinely pleased that Christopher Luxon has ruled out working with Brian Tamaki - he is a dangerous extremist - I am very surprised it took him eight days to do that."
"Politics will always throw you different kinds of days and I was very pleased yesterday to be able to deliver a speech around the question of ruling out Brian Tamaki and his extremism, and you could argue that Christopher Luxon's u-turn, flip-flop on that represented a good thing.
"Politics does that. On any given day many things can happen, [you just] get on with the job."
