National’s interim leader Shane Reti has been thrust into the spotlight in the past 24 hours and many are asking whether he’s the answer to the party’s leadership woes. Political editor Jo Moir explains why he’s not.
Asked whether he’ll be running for the leadership not even an hour after Judith Collins had been voted out, Shane Reti did something that doesn’t come naturally to him.
He answered the question like a politician, that is, he didn’t answer the question at all and left the media guessing.
Some political observers are questioning why he isn’t being seriously considered as leadership potential.
Reti is a medical practitioner, a Harvard graduate, a musician, and most recently a Covid-19 vaccinator.
He’s been leading the charge in the health portfolio during the pandemic but a couple of months ago decided his skills were better used out in the field in Northland, returning to his turangawaewae to vaccinate his people in the North.
It’s an admirable thing to do and came naturally to Reti, who is a trained GP and spent 17 years caring for his community in Whangarei before entering Parliament in 2014.
He is of Ngāti Hine, Ngāpuhi and Ngati Wai descent and last year he stepped up in the aftermath of a disastrous election to be deputy to Collins.
For the most part he’s done the job well, which involves not undermining or overshadowing your leader.
But being a competent deputy doesn’t put you on a path to leader.
Yes, Jacinda Ardern clearly is the exception in the current Parliament after she took over from Andrew Little in 2017 and went on to become Prime Minister.
She did overshadow and out-poll Little and that’s exactly what a leader doesn’t want in their deputy.
In the same way Kelvin Davis is a perfectly good deputy leader to Ardern, he’s not a leader and he definitely didn’t make a good acting Prime Minister.
If he did, he’d be deputy prime minister, which he is not.
Davis, like Reti, is good at the stuff he knows well but isn’t a natural politician.
Ironically both Davis and Reti are fantastic orators on the marae and their understanding of Māori politics is second to none, but that is a completely different playing field to Parliament.
Labour’s David Parker fits the same mould but for different reasons.
As deputy to David Cunliffe, Parker was the quieter deep-thinking introvert, and has never at any point been seriously considered leadership potential.
He did give it a crack though after Cunliffe resigned, and came in third place behind Andrew Little and Grant Robertson.
Despite that failure, Parker has held many ministerial portfolios and is rightly considered a safe pair of hands in government.
Reti is smart, caring and thoughtful but he isn’t agile enough to hold his own in portfolio areas he isn’t across.
He’s a deep thinker and has a tendency to get stuck in the weeds, which is fine if his job is to work up policy and discussion documents - but not so much if a controversial story has just broken and you’ve got questions flying at you from all directions in a press conference.
Political leaders need to be a step ahead of the headlines, and have an explanation or holding line if something unexpected comes their way.
They need to have a natural grasp of where the majority of New Zealanders sit on a wide range of issues and be able to articulate that in the moment.
There’s also an expectation a leader will appear comfortable and confident on camera, with the emotional range to navigate any number of issues at any given moment.
And ultimately, they need to understand politics and how Parliament works and how to get one up on the other side.
None of those things come particularly naturally to Reti, which is why he won’t make the transition to leader or Prime Minister.
There is nothing stopping one of the leadership contenders running a ticket with Reti as deputy, but if they’re after a clean start they might see Reti as being tarnished by Collins.
It’s unclear how much he knew about the whole Jacqui Dean/Simon Bridges fiasco and he’s refusing to answer questions about what went on, saying they were private conversation and he won’t be divulging the details.
Sometimes in politics not being a politician is the best use of one’s time.
Reti is a respected Māori MP and the National Party’s ethnic diversity was severely diminished when the caucus reduced from 55 to 33 MPs after last year’s election loss.
His understanding of Māori and iwi kaupapa is valuable though and any new leadership would be foolish not to have him on their frontbench.
The reality is, he’d achieve far more than anyone else in his caucus if he spent the weekend ignoring the leadership race and instead concentrating on breaking down vaccine hesitancy and getting jabs in arms.
Sometimes in politics not being a politician is the best use of one’s time.
