Taking a Step to the Right?

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Hard knocks: "I like John Key's path in life," says James Watson, head of the Crime Control Unit for the north shore of Auckland. "I think the honesty and integrity are there. He's a bit untested, but I'm confident he’d go okay."

Photograph for TIME by Nigel Marple

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Power and Passion
If key lacks intensity, that probably wouldn't bother many New Zealanders. While they take their politics seriously here — voter turnout in general elections has averaged nearly 90% since 1960, up there with the highest rates in the world among countries where voting isn't compulsory — they're also politically phlegmatic, saving their strongest emotions for more important matters, like rugby.

On a Friday afternoon at Key's alma mater, psychology student Michael Hempseed is rushing off to his part-time supermarket job, while elsewhere on campus a large portion of the student body has begun a raucous, migratory end-of-semester party. The days of universities as hotbeds of political dissent are over — in New Zealand, at least. Generally speaking, the main concerns of today's students are drinking and study — in that order, says Hempseed: "It feels like we're missing out on something." The 23-year-old will be voting Labour for two reasons. One, the economy will need special care and Labour is more experienced. And two, the downturn will create a new batch of unemployed who'll need looking after. "There are a lot of people on benefits who really should be working," Hempseed says. "But there'll be a lot of others who'll need the safety net and I feel that would be at some risk under National."

And if Key's Springbok tour comments were a sign of political naïvety, then that's all right too, says Frank Williams, who owns an agricultural contracting and cartage business in Cambridge in the Waikato region of the North Island. "Helen Clark is a fantastic politician. You can never take that away from her," says Williams. "She's very good at the political game. But maybe we've had enough of that." Key's learning fast, though — or perhaps his memory's good. Asked in the debate what it meant to be rich, Clark waffled, while Key sounded genuine talking about not having to live in fear of the next bill. His comments on welfare have stamped him as a compassionate conservative with a pragmatic streak: "I think you judge a country by the way you look after the sick and vulnerable, but also by how many sick and vulnerable people you create, and we have to get that balance right."

The balance is right as it is, says Anne Dickson, a Maori single mother of five in South Auckland. "He's too hard," she says of Key. "Some of us are struggling. Some of us haven't got any skills." Through a government Family Assistance package, Dickson, 26, gets the rent paid on a three-bedroom house and $NZ350 a week in the hand. The money tends to run out by Mondays, two days before she's paid again. But she makes do by cooking stews that can be stretched over a couple of nights. She's grateful for what she gets: "Helen," Dickson says, "I give her 100%."

On the other side of Auckland, Detective Sergeant James Watson has been won over by Key. In a year in which violent crime has risen by 12%, the would-be P.M. has played the tough guy to good effect, winning broad public approval for proposals including boot camp for young offenders and the scrapping of parole for hard-core criminals. "I'm not having, on my watch, people on the streets who've committed heinous crimes," Key told a national television audience. He's also made familiar right-of-center noises on education, foreshadowing national standards for literacy and numeracy, and plain-speaking school reports. "I think it's time for a change," says Watson, 18 years a cop, "and I know some of my colleagues are hanging out for one."

Clark, meanwhile, is struggling to seduce voters with lofty talk on combating climate change. The notion that the planet is on the brink of catastrophe from this amorphous force is a hard sell in New Zealand, where water is abundant and lush pastoral land rolls on forever. Clark wants New Zealand, which produces 0.4% of the world's carbon emissions, to set the pace on emissions cuts, just as it was the first country to grant women the vote (1893) and the first Western-allied nation to legislate itself into nuclear-free status (1987). "New Zealand has got to be part of solving serious problems," Clark said on Oct. 14, "not just sitting on the sidelines." Most of the provisions of her government's Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading) Amendment Act came into force in September. While New Zealanders want their country to be a solid global citizen, the idea of compromising the economy at a time like this in order to chip in on climate change has many of them stumped. "We're tiny, and here we are trying to lead the world," says agricultural business owner Williams. "What are we trying to prove?"

The "It's Time" Factor
The brewers arms in the Christchurch suburb of Merivale attracts a range of patrons, from high-fliers to battlers and everyone in between. In the evenings, the genial publican Wayne Williams likes to move among them, to hear their stories and their gripes. "My gut feeling is we're going to get a change of government," he says. Williams hopes his feeling is right. He respects Clark — he once watched her in a meeting "cut through the bulls... in no time flat" — and voted Labour in 2005. "But not this time," he says. "The place needs an overhaul. They're turning the place into a nanny state. The idea bank is drying up."

Some 200 kilometres to the north, in a roadside stall off State Highway 1, Adrianne Rochford contemplates the election while selling crayfish and mussels to passing tourists. "It's a tricky one," says Rochford, who's voted Labour most of her life. Yes, she's heard praise for Key and wouldn't mind seeing him in the Beehive. But she adds: "Who's it going to help?" New Zealanders would have a variety of answers to that question. But in many cases, it's not help exactly that they want. More than anything, come Nov. 8, they're looking for something new.