22 Aug 2013

Analysis: Shearer's leadership was doomed from the start

4:33 pm on 22 August 2013

David Shearer surprised even his fellow Labour MPs with his announcement he was resigning as party leader.

Radio New Zealand's political editor Brent Edwards looks at what went wrong.

In retrospect David Shearer's leadership of the Labour Party was doomed from the very start.

When the previous leader, Phil Goff, stepped down the party had the bright idea of holding campaign meetings at which the candidates made their pitch to party members about why they should become the next leader.

There was only one problem: the members did not have a vote. They overwhelmingly supported the other contender, David Cunliffe, on the basis of his much stronger performances at those meetings.

Mr Cunliffe, though, was considered toxic by many of his fellow MPs and when it came to the caucus vote Mr Shearer won.

Immediately the wider party was offside. Their favoured candidate had lost. Nor did Mr Shearer gain their support with his early efforts as leader. Both in Parliament and in the media he was hesitant and unconvincing.

Mr Shearer's performance improved but not enough to persuade his doubters that he had what it took to be leader.

Throughout all this Mr Shearer had to put up with persistent rumours about his leadership. This came to a head at Labour's annual conference last year. Following the conference he demoted Mr Cunliffe for his lack of loyalty.

That only inflamed Mr Cunliffe's supporters, although it did quell leadership rumours for awhile.

In the end, though, Mr Shearer lost support among his MPs as Labour's support in opinion polls remained resolutely stuck in the low 30s. He had hoped to lift the party's support to at least the high 30s.

Labour's relative failure in the polls influenced the view both party members and MPs had about his leadership. In these days of a more presidential approach to politics he took the blame for Labour's woes.

But in comparative terms he was doing well.

Under Helen Clark Labour's poll rating slumped to 15% just months out from the 1996 election. But she survived and ended up being a three-term Prime Minister.

In Ms Clark's case, though, she had strong networks throughout the Labour Party and a solid core of support within the caucus.

Mr Shearer, who has spent most of his working life outside New Zealand, was relatively unknown to the party. He had no time to develop networks within the party, nor build a solid base of support within the caucus.

As a result he failed to receive the support from both his party and MPs that Helen Clark enjoyed, even briefly.

In some ways Mr Shearer was too nice to be leader. His resignation is testimony to that. There was no caucus challenge, just a decision by Mr Shearer that it was time to go.

There was no bitter fight to the end, no recriminations.

In his resignation speech Mr Shearer said the party was bigger than one man's ambition. So he has put his ambition second to the best interests of the party.

The party, which has undermined him for much of the time he was leader, may now at last thank him.