Does National Represent the Nation?

A National-led government that can no longer claim, with any credibility, to represent the nation, is a National-led Government on the ropes.

WHAT HAS HAPPENED to the National Party? It’s once impressive ability to organise the diverse interests of its electoral base into a coherent policy agenda appears to have almost entirely disappeared. In its place stands a political project driven by a disconcerting combination of personal ambition and professional lobbying: part bucket-list, part wish-list, part to-do-list. Lacking the strength to rise above the dead-weight of the particular and see the big picture, National no longer seems capable of producing leaders equal to the task of embodying and articulating the (small-n) national interest.