Endless Government

Showing the kind of leadership which has marked his time at the helm, calmly steering the ship of state through the many Scyllas and Charybdises which have beset us of late, John Key this week announced his support for a four-year parliamentary term. This, I think, is an ingenious idea which ought to have been implemented eons ago. Given that the raison d'etre of our governments of all political hues is largely to do nothing, it makes little sense to keep chopping and changing from one party to the other, when they are both equally as good at doing nothing. We might as well extend the term over which each party can do nothing, thereby saving us considerable sums of money otherwise wasted in pointless elections, held merely to determine which party will be in charge of doing nothing for the allotted time. It will also spare us the pain we suffer every third year of the current cycle when each party hoists itself onto its collective feet to announce various initiatives that won't be implemented should they be elected.

Frankly, I get fairly giddy at just the thought of how much each party could not be doing over the course of four, rather than three, years. To put it in a manner beloved of economists, thereby making it look as if it might have a passing relationship to the actual world we live in, if x represents the amount of nothing that can be done in three years, then x + (1 x y) must equal the amount that might not be done in four years. It's astoundingly clever and the Prime Minister is to be heartily commended for his stance. Of course, there is an insistent logic underlying this which won't be ignored: surely, the very best thing to do would be to scrap elections altogether, and simply have a permanent government doing more or less nothing for the foreseeable future. Imagine the savings!

The Prime Minister finds all manner of fun things to do to while away the time.

A word, meanwhile, in passing on something the current government has done recently, which is to oversee an impressive reduction in the unemployment figures. Admittedly, this has happened, not because lots of people have found work, but because lots of people have given up looking for work, and so they no longer count as 'job-seekers'. Now, in the interests of keeping up morale, I believe the government should see here an opportunity and should actively promote to those currently unemployed the hopelessness of their situation, thereby encouraging them to join the ranks of those who have given up looking for work, in turn bringing about a further stellar reduction in the unemployment figures. On the back of these figures, New Zealand will then be able to stand proud amongst the developed nations of the world, and even those who are starving and homeless will at least be able to feel good about their contribution to making New Zealand look just that little bit better!

A different kind of unemployment

As news broke today that the number of those without work in New Zealand has increased for the third quarter running, there was yet a glimmer of light in the darkness. The Minister of Economic Development announced that what these people are experiencing is a ‘different kind of unemployment’. In a display of political gymnastics so dynamic the likes of it surely hasn’t been seen since the virtuoso performance put on by Donald Rumsfeld (‘…as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know….’), the Minister danced around the issue majestically. Here he was pirouetting on a series of figures and statistics rattled off at mind-numbing speed, then without a pause, he was deftly vaulting across a raft of principles and promises before nailing a perfect landing right on top of the opposition parties. It was breath-taking.

Now, I’m no expert on unemployment, and certainly no expert on employment (always doing my best to avoid it whenever possible, as I do), and I have to admit that the Minister lost me a little as he effortlessly floated across the parallel bars, but it seems to me that a different kind of unemployment has to be a good thing. It is surely irrefutable that if being normally unemployed means not having a job, then being differently unemployed must, by an act of inescapable logic, mean that you mustn’t not have a job, although at the same time it obviously doesn’t mean that you do have a job. It’s a sort of employment limbo, if you will, or a purgatory where you pay penance for your sins (no doubt the normal unemployment was the consequence of some kind of sin, so it’s only fair some kind of penance is paid). I might be hopelessly wrong on all this – I’m no expert as I said – and perhaps the Minister will enlighten us at some point as to the details, but in the meantime, it’s nice to think that all those people without a job have finally had some good news.