Larry Williams Drive

It is election year, of course, and I reckon we should get this thing over and done with quickly. Let's rip the band-aid off - Luxon should go to the polls early. The argument's always been - and we talked about this a lot last year -  that they should wait till November, go late, let the economy recover. Make sure people feel the recovery and not just hear about it and read about it in the newspapers, but I think the political calculation has changed over the summer break. Luxon's grip on National, and the coalition more generally, has always been pretty weak, let's be honest. He struggles for cut-through. His colleagues are only really keeping him there because instability looks worse than his performance. This doesn't mean he's doing a terrible job. Inflation is coming down, recovery is underway, education is being dealt to, as is crime, this is good. But politics isn't always about facts, much as it should be. Because it's also vibes, isn't it? And it's been seen to be bold and be strong. N