The one phrase that made up nearly 10% of all the words spoken by the PM following a confidence vote in his leadership this morning.

Christopher Luxon didn’t talk to the media for long following a three-and-a-half-hour meeting on his leadership on Wednesday, but he made the most of the time available. The current – at time of writing – prime minister of New Zealand got his main news item out of the way early, revealing a second confidence vote in his leadership had confirmed he had the full support of his caucus.

That statement alone raises big questions. Why does a man who has the full support of his caucus keep ordering emergency confidence votes in his leadership? Does he just like holding them as a team bonding experience? Is this like MMP, where once people have had a PM in place for a while, they should have a say on whether to continue the same system? Was he simply having a bad week and needed to call his friends to Wellington to give him compliments?

Luxon didn’t say. Instead he spent most of his 76 seconds at the podium in parliament’s banquet hall repeating variations of National’s campaign slogan. The words “fix the basics and build the future” made up a full 9.4% of all the words he spoke; more if you exclude ones like “thank you”.

But what were his most memorable, incisive uses of the phrase which many voters are calling the hottest new campaign slogan of the year? For that we need a ranking, starting with…

3. “Our plan to fix the basics and to build the future is a positive plan. A very positive plan.”

Repetition can be effective in speeches. Here it just reads as desperate. Is Luxon reassuring us that his plan to fix the basics and build the future is positive, or is he reassuring himself? 

This phrase appeared early in Luxon’s speech, before he’d even got to the news about everyone in his caucus being absolutely stoked to still have him as PM, and there was a slightly haunted quality to its delivery. Perhaps Luxon still hadn’t banished the memories of the last week from his mind: the terrible quotes from an apparently discontented MP who told the Herald’s Thomas Coughlan “there’s going to be change” in the leadership. The silence from his senior MPs as they stalked through Wellington airport being peppered with questions about whether he had their support. Luxon was about to confirm they did support him, but did he still support Luxon.

2. “The choice for voters, which is crystal clear on November 7, is an opposition that wants to take New Zealand backwards, or a National government that wants to fix the basics and build the future.”

Luxon concluded his speech urging people to remember that National is the party that wants to fix the basics and build the future, and that by contrast, its opposition is not openly committed to fixing the basics and building the future. It’s a stirring sentiment, reminding voters principally that National wants to fix the basics and build the future. But it’s a little overlong and convoluted. Its focus on the opposition is also questionable, tactically. Yes, it takes the heat off National, but do you really want to remind the nation’s voters there are other parties out there that don’t hold bi-monthly confidence votes in their leader, even if they don’t fix any basics or build any futures?

1. “Our caucus is united and it is determined to win this election. Our focus is on National’s positive plan to fix the basics and to build the future.”

This is the sentence that really made voters think National is the party that wants to fix the basics and build the future. Before Luxon said this, people might have worried that National’s caucus wasn’t united or determined to win the election. They might have angsted a little about anonymous briefings to the media, plunging poll numbers or the unchecked spread of Winston Peters across the body politic, and perhaps come to the conclusion that another party would be better placed to fix a basic or indeed build a future. But here Luxon is clear: National’s caucus has its sights set on a single goal, and that is electoral victory, not knifing their leader repeatedly in the nads. This is a party that wants to fix the basics and build the future. Its plan is positive. Very positive.

Fix the basics and build the future (my leadership is fine)

An address to the nation by prime minister Christopher Luxon, in full.

Kia ora, good morning, everyone. As you know, this is an absolutely pivotal election with some very, very serious issues at stake for New Zealand. We think we have made tremendous progress as a government, rebuilding economic growth, financial discipline, restoring law and order, and certainly strengthening education and healthcare. But we also acknowledge that we have a lot more to do. Our plan to fix the basics and to build the future is a positive plan – a very positive plan – to help New Zealand realise the innate potential that it has. 

There was a confidence vote in my leadership this morning at our caucus meeting, and I have the full support of our caucus. And our caucus is united, and it is determined to win this election. 

Our focus is on National’s positive plan to fix the basics and to build the future, so that we realise the incredible potential that sits in this country, and that we set it up for our kids and our grandkids so they can do better than we can. 

It’s also an opportunity to frame the choice for voters, which is crystal clear on November the seventh, an opposition that wants to take New Zealand backwards, or a national government that wants to fix the basics and build the future, and with a plan that takes New Zealand forward. 

With that, I want to say thanks, everyone. We’re going back to work, and we’re moving on. Thank you very much.