Labour's Misinformation Crisis
It turns out the misinformation was coming from inside the house all along
The Labour Party finds itself in an awkward position over public transport. According to a detailed story by Stuff, it looks like the government indicated that half-price public transport fares would be made available to disabled New Zealanders. That was not the case, however, leading to some shock from those counting on the discount.
That’s bad enough. It gets worse.
However, as Twitter savant @BenThomasNZ has pointed out, Labour has been running attack ads accusing National of plotting to cut "free public transport for disabled Kiwis." In other words, accusing National of cutting an initiative Labour never actually delivered.
There is a clear pattern here
This all comes as Labour’s campaign consistently finds itself spreading misinformation. List MP Willie Jackson falsely claimed during a debate that National and ACT intend to abolish the minimum wage. He later "corrected" his statement, stating that the two parties would only "lower the minimum wage." Which is also false.
Andrew Little wrote a Facebook post that falsely declared that National and ACT plan to "flog off the schools and sack all the teachers." This is not remotely true. Northcote MP Shanan Halbert wrongly affirmed a comment on his Facebook page that National would reduce sick leave to five days. National has committed to keeping it at 10 days.
It’s not just individual candidates either
That was hot on the heels of false Instagram claims that a National-ACT coalition would reintroduce interest rates on student loans, leading Police Minister Ginny Andersen to admit it was an "outright mistake."
Labour recently accused ACT of planning to reintroduce military-style guns into communities. This may be a fair criticism on the merits. However, the party couched its criticism as a response to a news story when it was in fact a misleadingly framed press release of… the Labour Party.
Can the PM really talk?
Newshub reports that Chris Hipkins has reminded his team to be more careful about getting the facts right. But the reality is that, for all his strengths, Hipkins does not himself have a great track record when it comes to the conveyance of accurate facts.
Consider the following, recalled from the top of my head:
Misinformation that downplayed the security situation in Hawkes Bay post cyclone.
Falsely blaming a retail worker for spreading covid by going into work while sick.
Giving the media the wrong idea on the vaccine schedule and presenting a misleading graph on the rollout, which turned out to be merely 'illustrative' and not based on factual data.
Saying in Parliament that a person earning a million dollars a year would get over $50,000 extra per year with National’s proposed tax cuts, inflating the benefit by about 25 times the actual benefit.
How bad is it? This bad
The Disinformation Project is a team of New Zealand researchers that collect, analyse and comment on disinformation and causes. The government claims to be worried about disinformation and it has worked for the government on this front. It is seen by sceptics, however, as being very left wing in orientation and not overly interested in looking at disinformation that comes from a leftward direction.
“Here’s another one for the Disinformation Project” is a common social media jape whenever some leftwing group or person gets caught out spreading stuff that isn’t true.
And yet even the Disinformation Project has felt compelled to make comment on the river of false claims. It’s a pretty weak comment, of course, and it avoids giving any examples, naming any names or identifying any parties. It also downplays the effect of the statements.
Nevertheless, the fact that something was said is reflective of the fact that truthfulness is becoming an issue for Labour.
There is line between spin and making stuff up
You can't have your cake and eat it too. Political parties and individuals cannot perpetuate misinformation while at the same time claiming to be horrified at the prospect of a post-truth society. If you're going to talk the talk with moral grandstanding, you better be prepared to walk the walk and meet those high standards.
The government is not so prepared. That is the only conclusion we can draw from Labour’s apparent determination to fight disinformation and its willingness to propagate it when convenient.