NZ First leader Winston Peters promises to bring 'steel' to Government

New Zealand First leader and Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters is promising to bring “steel” to the Government as it faces tough economic times.

Hundreds of people have gathered to hear New Zealand First leader Winston Peters’ State of the Nation address today at the Palmerston North conference centre.

There was a small protest outside the conference centre where Peters gave his speech.

There were about 20 Free Palestine protestors gathered. One used a megaphone to push their message as Peters entered the premises.

He didn’t say anything to the protestors, except to look at them and shake his head.

During his address, Peters referenced the protesters as the “group outside saying ‘Winston go home’”. On the Israel-Hamas conflict, he said the Government had “done our best”.

Peters said NZ First’s absence from Parliament during the 2020-2023 term was the chief reason why the country had gone downhill.

”Without the handbrake, Labour cared more about feelings than the duty to competently govern our country.”

Peters railed against the media, once again claiming he wasn’t covered during the election campaign.

He said the country couldn’t be fixed until its problems were acknowledged. He claimed Labour had left a “barrage of broken promises”, citing a “crumbling, underfunded health system”.

On education, Peters spoke of the “staggering” number of classrooms New Zealand was lacking and the levels of truancy.

He is touching on many topics briefly, shifting from the workforce issues within the Defence Force to the current approach to gangs and the failed targets of KiwiBuild.

Peters talked of the “implosion on the left”, a reference to the Green Party launching an investigation into MP Darleen Tana, whose husband’s business has been accused of migrant exploitation.

He referenced Tana not by name but as the person who “had the moko on her chin”.

Peters criticised the recent high levels of immigration, saying there had been no proper planning by the previous Government for the number of migrants it wanted to bring in after Covid-19.

“We had three years of the dripping, self-righteous moral high-horse - where they were right and everyone else was wrong,” Peters said of Labour during its time as a majority Government.

“The problem for Labour was that there were no ‘ends’ because they had no concept of where they were going - the hapless freight train ran out of tracks.”

Peters said there was no greater expert on Labour’s lack of humility or understanding of democracy than he.

He grouped Labour, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori together, saying they were competing to see “who can be most culturally woke”. Peters said that when MPs from those parties were in the media, they were “always over-gesturing like an Italian waiter”, which received a lot of laughs from the crowd.

Much of Peters’ speech so far has been focused on Labour. He has bemoaned how Labour has forgotten its roots and wasn’t focusing on workers’ rights, which was at its core and spent many minutes criticising Labour’s record while in government. He is yet to talk much of the Government he is currently part of.

“The once-great Labour Party of Savage and Fraser has turned into the ‘Party of Moral Outrage and Political Inertia’.”

He talked about the prospect of Newshub closing and job losses at TVNZ, saying it was “obviously devastating” for people and for the fourth estate.

However, he shifted to criticism of mainstream media, particularly focusing on the Public Interest Journalism Fund.

“[The fund] created a media environment where certain left-wing political narratives and agendas seeped into much of what the media presented to the public - where any opposing views were shut down, cancelled and labelled as ‘far-right’ or ‘fringe’.”

The crowd is responding very well to Peters’ comments about the media, laughing and heckling towards reporters.

Moving on to the current Government, Peters said it was facing “massive challenges”.

“With the right polices, the right attitude and above all the right commitment, we can secure a much better future.”

“Our campaign message was for voters to join us to ‘Take Back Our Country’ - and that’s what we intend to do.”

“We are the party that is bringing steel to our Government through the hard times, and above all experience and common sense.”

He is now recapping the commitments made in the coalition agreement between National and NZ First, including an inquiry into banking competition, strengthening the Grocery Commissioner’s powers, establishing a National Infrastructure Agency and investigating the reopening of the Marsden Point Oil Refinery - the last of which getting huge applause. Reopening the refinery is a common priority among a lot of NZ First supporters.

Peters promised to list only a few of the commitments in the coalition agreement but he seems to be listing quite a few on a range of topics such as health, crime, education, seniors rights, gender in sport and Covid-19.

Nearly every item Peters is listing is getting clapped by the crowd of about 600.

On the economy, he contrasted New Zealand with Australia to underline his point that this country’s economy had performed much worse in comparison to that across the ditch.

Peters referenced Iceland and how people earned tens of thousands of dollars more than people in New Zealand.

”Size matters? No, it doesn’t. What you do with the assets does.

“We bring steel to our Government,” Peters repeated, speaking of NZ First.

One of his final topics is the Treaty of Waitangi. Peters pushed back on the idea that it was “a partnership between the signatories”.

”Today what is being taught at universities on this matter denies the simple fact that neither Queen Victoria, nor her successors, could constitutionally enter, with their subjects, a partnership.”

He claimed a “self-appointed Māori elite” had benefited from the misinterpretation at the expense of “ordinary Māori” - a common message of Peters.

“We got knocked down, but we got back up again - and nothing is going to stop us now,” was Peters’ last line of his hour-long speech - quoting from the song he entered on.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon gave his State of the Nation speech last month in Auckland.

Adam Pearse is a political reporter in the NZ Herald Press Gallery team, based at Parliament. He has worked for NZME since 2018, covering sport and health for the Northern Advocate in Whangārei before moving to the Herald in Auckland, covering Covid-19 and crime.