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I don't see things in such doom and gloom National eat babies terms. I think that they have done a pretty good job by most measurements, but that the time has come for some attention to be paid to the things that National has not considered high priority stuff.
I'll be the first to admit I love Bill's technocratic approach to welfare because
Spending money on at-risk kids when they are kids is way cheaper than spending money on them when they're adults
...is the sort of thing that even neoliberal rich pricks can get behind. Looking after our kids saves the taxpayer money is a leftwing goal with a rightwing justification.
My sorta kinda gut feeling on the election: English and Key have, for nine years, generally had a "no surprises" policy of telling people what they're going to do, then doing it effectively. Their priorities and decisions have been generally centrist with nods to the outer reaches of each side of the (admittedly silly) 2-dimensional spectrum we're used to thinking about. Their management has put NZ in a very very healthy position economically relative to other OECD countries. Unemployment is low, inflation is low, government debt relative to GDP is declining, and we've had govt surpluses for three years in a row and was on track for something like 2.8% of GDP by 2022. Fucking caning it economically.
But it seems like this has come at a high social cost. I'm in another country so don't have on-the-ground visibility of this stuff, but it sounds to me* as if things like homelessness, mental health, youth suicide stats are in a horrible state for a country that has been doing so well economically. If there is 1.8billion left over after government spending this year, and depressed kids killing themselves left and right, well hey maybe we shoulda spent some of that money amirite.
The worst bit is Winston's involvement. He's a populist parasite yearning for the good old days of Muldoonist state control of everything backed by a voter bloc of old white racists. I deliberately partyvoted Green this election just in case we ended up in this situation, where an inexperienced lefty leadership is being led around by the nose by an experienced Winston.
* I read Lightspeed's posts
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