Andrew Dickens: Luxon shoots himself in the foot, time and time again

Andrew Dickens Afternoons

What a wild and woolly weekend on the hustings.

Christopher Luxon turns up on Q&A to talk about National's policies.

First up, he promises to close Rotorua's emergency housing motels and kick any troublesome Kainga Ora social housing tenants out.

Obviously, this is great news for law abiding Rotorua residents and New Zealanders suffering from the neighbours from hell.

But he forgot that people ask follow up questions. Like, so where do you put these people? To which he has no answer.

This is not good. Don't take my word for it. Avowed right winger Ashley Church was on Early Edition said this went too far. The State is the landlord of last resort, blah blah blah blah.

The social housing and the motels were a bad answer to a bad problem. Get rid of them and all you have is a badder problem getting worse. And if you think feral's behaviours are bad in a state house you wait until they live in a car. Luxon offered nothing.

Then he said their housing policies would provide downward pressure on rents. Of course, we all know he's a landlord so Tame asked the obvious question, "So will you reduce rents for your tenants in this new environment?". What followed was a stammering exercise. Claire Trevett describes it as a rookie MP in an interview with no answers.

Here's the thing, he's auditioning for the top job in the nation. If he can't stand up to Jack Tame, what's going to happen when Xi Jinping starts asking some hard house tax questions? What's going to happen in the leader's debates?

The reason this is a concern is because Labour really does seem like the Walking Dead. Fresh from their spectacular second term implosion and the loss of cabinet Minister after Cabinet Minister. After 6 years of failed promise after failed promise. With Hipkins seeming to be low on energy and new ideas and only bursting into life slagging the opposition. With all the other Labour MPs existing in radio silence either because they've been muted or they've got nothing to say. After all that, National should be romping home.

It should be like shooting fish in a barrel. Instead, Christopher Luxon just shoots himself in the foot. Time and time again.

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