You might have heard Mike Hosking this morning relaying the conversation we had during the news break in the office.
I told him that as soon as I heard Winston Peters this morning on the drive into work, being his typical curmudgeonly self; I switched over to Coast and had the great good fortune to land on Wham! and Wake Me Up Before You Go, Go,and - I sang along merrily till the end of the song.
I turned back to Mike at the end to hear him give a time check, perfect timing. Brilliant Wham! song- no Winston to ruin my day and I could enjoy the rest of the Mike Hosking Breakfast.
The latest Taxpayers Union Curia poll shows Labour crashing to below 30 percent. National and Act with enough support to form a government. But here he is, here he comes, Winston Peters above the 5 percent threshold and returning to Parliament.
As I have said many times, I reached peak Winston years ago.
But as Mike says, don't blame Winston, blame the system. He says we voted for MPP.
I didn't. I voted for STV in 1993 and then again in the 2011 referendum.
For those who don't like to see the tail wagging the dog, we had a chance to change the electoral system in 2011.
You can accept that there was this big campaign in 1993 that promoted MMP. There were people against specifically MMP, so that was all we heard about was MMP. So people voted for it.
But then we had a chance again in 2011. And yet again, people voted to keep MMP.
We live in a democracy where everyone's vote is given equal value. And thus, you know, we have to accept the result.
But seriously, when you think of some of the callers who don't care about politics here, who have voted the same way, will always vote the same way, who are basically tribal, and that's on both sides of the spectrum.
People who simply refused to countenance another party, it is always going to be frustrating for people who do care and who vote based on performance or what might be best for the country.
As long as we have MMP, we will have Winston Peters or Winston Peters pretenders. We are getting exactly what we voted for.
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