Labour leader Chris Hipkins yesterday ruled in working with National on some things, such as long-term infrastructure projects. However, he also told attendees at a business leader’s breakfast held in Dunedin on Friday morning that he would not consider a “grand coalition” with the National party. A grand coalition, where the two major parties form a government together, has been proposed at various times by political commentators as a way to stymie smaller parties from exerting undue influence on the political process. Over the years, both National and Labour leaders have scotched the suggestion whenever it has arisen, and Mr Hipkins was quick to dismiss it when the question was put to him yesterday. The experience of countries overseas where it had been tried had been that it had pushed more voters to the extreme left or extreme right, and he did not think that was healthy, the Labour leader said. However, he was more open to the idea of working closely with National, whether in government or opposition, on things like infrastructure planning. “On infrastructure I’m more optimistic because I think we’ve finally reached the point where people have realised that going around the country promising big, giant projects which they don’t get to go live is actually more of a political liability than an asset,’’ he said. “When you look at it, these are 10-, 20-year projects. The new Dunedin hospital for example, it’s not a project that was going to be completed in a single or even multiple parliamentary terms. It’s a fairly big project, takes a long, long time. “We just have to map those out and then just look at it relatively objectively and say, ‘What’s the best way of tackling this?’ The real debate, though, is how do we pay for it?’’ The four main areas Labour would campaign on during the election were the cost of living, health equity, housing affordability and job creation, Mr Hipkins said. “We’ve got to create more well-paid jobs here in New Zealand. If we can keep more of our talent here in New Zealand, we can create more opportunity here.’’
