Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Has Luxon entered 'dead man walking' territory?

Look, I know we’re all going to have different points at which we think the media reaction to a news story gets silly but for me, that point was this morning. 

Members of the media chasing the Prime Minister through Wellington Airport, asking whether he was considering resigning and whether he had the full support of his caucus seemed a little bit silly to me. Silly because it’s not as if he’s gone to ground for the past four days, is it?

He was on morning media today - two radio interviews and at least one TV appearance - and he’s also fronted a post-Cabinet news conference. So it’s not as though the media are starved of opportunities to talk to the Prime Minister without chasing him through a crowded terminal.

All it does is create the impression of drama where no real drama exists.

There is no coup. All of his ministers are backing him publicly. Privately, sure, maybe a little less so - but publicly, they are. Luxon remains the leader until he is talked out of being the leader and there’s no sign that’s happening. In short, nothing is happening in the short term.

Now, if I try to understand why the media wanted to chase him through the airport, perhaps it’s because they sense things have shifted - and that part is true. Since the poll on Friday morning that put National at 28 percent, two things have changed.

First, ministers who previously gave complete backing to Luxon are now doing so privately with a caveat: “Yeah, I support him… but.”

But he’s bad at taking advice, but he made a bad call with XYZ. Whatever the specifics, the point is the same: they’ve dropped their full confidence. That tells me something is going on in their heads.

Second, he has now entered what I’d describe as publicly “dead man walking” territory. Every bad poll from here, every major mistake - and there will be some - will reignite talk about his leadership. That is a slow bleed for any leader. It ends one of two ways - a spanking on election day, or the leader eventually calling it quits.

I think he’s now in that zone. I don’t think the coalition loses the election at this rate, but I do think National comes back as a mini version of itself - and that’s not great for them.

Maybe that electoral prognosis is what has the media so excited that they’re chasing him through the airport. But that’s a medium-term issue. Today? I think the brief excitement of the weekend is over and nothing is going to happen.

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