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New Zealand’s great democratic pantheon is starting to feel more like a high school debate session than a great temple of democracy.

The House still has the theatrical cheers and gears during Question Time but lately that main event of the sitting day has been deeply lacking is substance.

This is down to the drawcard of the bout being a fizzer most sitting days.

To put it simply: Chris Hipkins vs Chris Luxon is boring.

Even worse than boring in fact, it’s a waste of time.

A boring match-up in the House could be forgiven, if there was plenty of information to be gleaned from the question/ answer session.

Act Minister Brooke Van Velden, for example, doesn’t exactly bring the House down with passion when she’s being questioned on issues to do with Workplace Relations and Safety.

But her answers do provide valuable insight and information to the House and to those watching along.

On the other side of the coin, Shane Jones is a treat to watch in full flight. But so much of what he says in Question Time is style over substance.

The Prime Minister and Opposition leader’s bout is lacking in both style and in substance.

Chris Luxon is more interested in not losing than he is in providing real, genuine answers.

For example, on Wednesday Hipkins asked the Prime Minister: “Will he guarantee that his proposal to cut 6.5 percent from the Customs budget won't lead to longer times at airports, won't lead to delays for our importers and exporters, and won't lead to more illicit drugs entering New Zealand?”

Luxon replied: “What I can reassure that member is that this'll be a Government that will rebuild our economy, restore law and order, and deliver better public services in health and education.”

The Prime Minister’s response didn’t even come close to answering the question.

But according to the rules of Parliament, a Minister does not need to answer a question; they simply must address it.

That’s a rule that Luxon is bending to breaking point.

Every Question time is littered with examples of the Prime Minister deliberately obfuscating to get out of actually answering questions.

It’s clear Hipkins has had enough.

He’s now thought to have set a record for most “point of order” interruptions during questions to the Prime Minister.

And it’s not just Hipkins.

The Greens shadow leader of the House Ricardo Menendez March has also become quite a stickler for the rules.

The result is a painfully slow and drawn-out question and answer session with the Prime Minister, which vary rarely offers any actual insight.

In the first few months of this year, this wasn’t so much of an issue thanks to Question Time’s undercard.

If (and more often, when) Chris vs Chris was a fizzer, observers could always rely on Nicola vs Robertson to bring a bit more energy into the debate.

With Robertson gone, it's been up to new finance spokesperson Barbra Edmons to bring the heat.

But so far, she’s failed to fire in the House.

That’s not completely unexpected – it often takes a while for the opposition’s numbers person to find their feet. Willis herself took a while to adjust to the position.

But the lack of experience has allowed Willis to toy with the Opposition, and indeed the rules of the House.

An increasing number of answers are focused less on what the Government’s doing, and more on the shortcomings of the former Labour Government.

This is another area where Chris ‘Point of Order’ Hipkins has been forced to flex his law-making muscles.

On a near-daily basis now, Hipkins and his trusty lieutenant Kieran McAnulty are on their feet battling with the Speaker about Minister’s attacks on the last Government.

Some days they win, some days they lose.

But everyday this happens; the real losers are the poor souls watching at home, or in the public gallery who are spending more and more time listening politicians bickering over the rules, and less time heading answers to important questions.

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