Unlimited - Born and bred

Just when the National Party seemed to be on a hiding to nothing, along comes Mark Blumsky to further confuse candidacy issues here in the political heartland.

Blumsky, who in his former incarnation as Wellington’s mayor from 1995–2001 was hard-working cheerfulness personified, is almost certainly going to cause much hand wringing in the capital as he considers his options after standing down as United Future president in early August. As the erstwhile steward of city hall explained to a local radio network at the time, he made the move in order to free himself to look at new job opportunities, which he might best be “able to carry ... out if he has no political affiliations”.

But that explanation sounds slightly disingenuous in light of the fact that the city’s most popular pixie is understood to have his eye on just one big job opportunity — a parliamentary career via the Wellington Central seat — which will only transpire if he rather urgently acquires a new political affiliation. At this late stage, only the National Party, which is all but certain to muster a large slate of new MPs at the next election, could suit his current ambition. The party is expected to name its candidate for the country’s most symbolically important seat within the next few weeks.

This has all the makings of a headache for National. True, Blumsky was a very good mayor, with far better business smarts than virtually any of his predecessors. He also had an impressive common touch when it came to connecting with the kind of real-life issues that career politicians like his predecessor, Fran Wilde, only ever appreciated from a theoretical distance. In person, he is an amiable man who has only ever wanted to be liked by everyone, and he remains a popular character around town. But what Blumsky fatally lacks right now is any meaningful connection with the party that could be the government in less than a year’s time.

If they are to avoid the problems of National’s last electoral landslide — in 1990, when many new MPs quickly showed themselves to be parliamentary flakes — the conservatives know they must seek out aspirants with solid Tory credentials. Still less can they afford to be seen as creating a haven for last-minute bandwagon jumpers. Nowhere is this more the case than in Wellington Central.

The former shoe salesman’s only past connection with the conservatives is a brief stint in the Young Nats during his early 20s, a decision he later described as having been made “because they had good parties”. (His father, John Blumsky, unsuccessfully contested the seat of Lyttelton for National in 1972.)

It was only a matter of four months ago, after all, that Blumsky assumed the party presidency of United Future, vowing at the time that he was in for the long haul to lead the party into the next election. United Future, he said at the time, would be “well-placed to moderate the more fringe policies of Labour and National, while at the same time ensuring that the family becomes and remains the cornerstone of New Zealand society”.

Talk about flakey. In light of his almost immediate decampment from the Christian party, such utterances now sound about as convincing as Blumsky’s burbling in the lead-up to the third premiere of The Lord of the Rings, in which he played a high-profile organisational role, when he was forever nattering on to the media about unspecified terrorist threats to the occasion. In the event, of course, the premiere took place without so much as a hobbit’s head getting blown off.

But if not Blumsky, then who? Ideally, party insiders say, the chosen candidate will need to be somebody born, raised and educated in Wellington Central with a lifelong National Party connection. They would need to have strong family roots — better still, political family roots — in the city and a proven working knowledge of the New Zealand political scene. They would need to be highly skilled in political and media processes, have political nous and a track record in working with volunteers. It might even help if they happened to be ex-cabinet minister Max Bradford’s sister-in-law.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mrs Wrath is pleased to introduce the National Party’s only real candidate of choice for the country’s greatest electorate. A round of applause, please, for ... Ms Nicola Young.

Born and bred

Despite a high approval rating as the former mayor, Mark Blumsky may not be blue enough to contest the Wellington Central seat for National