With the “protest” at Parliament now over, we have the chance to take stock and to understand what has happened.

Following the scenes we witnessed yesterday, any claim that the protest was “peaceful and non-violent” can be dismissed. There will be some, however, who will maintain that the original protest was peaceful and that the early protesters were, as time went on, infiltrated by various and familiar elements of the international “far right” – the white supremacists, the conspiracy theorists, those hostile to government – any government, and government in general – Trump supporters, emulators of the 6 January attack on the Capitol – for all of whom the use of violence comes quite naturally. It was those elements, it is claimed, that transformed a protest by decent and responsible people into an attempted insurrection.

The evidence, however, does not support this analysis. The initial scale and impetus of the protest at Parliament could have been achieved only by determined people with a clear and agreed strategy and goal. The early protesters were spoiling for a fight. It was those extremists and revolutionaries who used the violent language, and issued the threats of execution, that set the scene and created the atmosphere of impending violent confrontation.

The “decent” and “peaceful” protesters were, on the whole, the later arrivals, attracted by the thrill of excitement and “a good day out” and the sense that, at last, they counted for something. Many of them were not so much “libertarians”, as merely opposed, on a range of different grounds, to the government – and this government in particular. Indeed, I suspect that for many the motivation was nothing more than to make life difficult for Jacinda and to swing public opinion against her. Wanting to change the government, and being unwilling to take the chance of waiting for and winning an election, may have been motivation enough for some.

What we saw yesterday was clear evidence of these two quite separate groups and motivations. The political opportunists bailed out quite early in the face of the police assault. Those who stayed to the bitter end and toughed it out were the “far right” warriors. They were dancing to a different tune, a tune orchestrated (and probably funded) from far away.

Reports that protesters intend to block Auckland harbour bridge as part of a “national campaign” suggest that – unbelievable as it may seem – this country is now on the brink of civil war. Violent and lawless forces are apparently intent on using force to remove the country’s elected government.

We now need to understand who these people are, what motivates them and who is financing them.

What is clear is that they represent and include a number of disparate groups – white supremacists, anti-semites, anti-islamists, conspiracy theorists, “libertarians”, Uncle Tom Cobley and all – all elements in what is now emerging as a world-wide resurgence of far-right, not to say fascist, movements.

In New Zealand, the unifying factor seems to be a hostility to our Prime Minister. It is becoming increasingly clear that the real focus of their anger is Jacinda Ardern, and equally apparent that the reason for this is that she is seen as the standard-bearer and central figure in the advancement of a socially aware approach to public policy that is true to this country’s history of democracy and social responsibility but which is the antithesis of the distorted goals of the far right. She is seen as the main obstacle to the triumph of those extreme views. There is no victory for anti-democratic forces until she is brought down.

Jacinda Ardern has had to confront a range of immediate and dramatic challenges beyond the experience of any of her predecessors. Instead of being recognised for the sterling job she has done, and despite the fact that her record has meant that she is seen, both at home and overseas, as the exemplar of what good government can achieve, she is seen by the far right as public enemy number one.

What is becoming further apparent is that the hostile reaction to her has come not only from fascistic opinion at home but also from similarly extreme opinion overseas. It is no exaggeration to say that our Prime Minister’s glowing reputation in other democracies is seen as a major obstacle to the advancement of right-wing causes across the globe. Would-be fascists cannot tolerate the notion that a government of the moderate left, wherever it may be, could merit support and commendation.

The parallel between our situation and that in Canada is too obvious to be missed. The Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, may not be in Jacinda’s class as an emblem of socially responsible government, but he is a prominent enough standard-bearer of the left to have attracted a similar degree of violent protest to what we have seen here.

These parallels suggest an obvious question. Is it purely coincidence that similar forces have emerged in both Canada and New Zealand to confront similarly moderate governments in the two countries? If not, what is the factor that unifies them?

That in turn raises a further question. How have these geographically disparate movements been funded (and funded they have surely been) and what has been the role of a handful of known right-wing and wealthy figures with ties to Donald Trump and a close interest in promoting extreme and anti-democratic causes?

It is virtually certain that the truth about these issues will eventually emerge. We cannot afford to wait until it does. Until it does, we had best be on our guard. The “protest” is almost certainly not just a domestic issue but is part of a world-wide resurgence of far-right opinion; whether or not the majority of protesters know it, it is more sinister than we may realise.

Christopher Luxon seems to want “a bob each way”. Surely the task of a (would-be) political leader is to lead – to make a decision, to make a choice between two options, to realise that you can’t ride two horses at once. His attempt to support the law and order option while at the same time trying to ingratiate himself with the protesters is surely not the action of a future Prime Minister. Heaven help us if he were ever entrusted with the responsibility of making some tough decisions.

As the “protest” in Wellington draws to its close, and middle New Zealand begins to re-assert itself, the question arises – what will be the political fallout from this unhappy episode?

Many commentators will already have concluded, as much of the media have constantly suggested, that the government will have suffered some damage in the voters’ minds from the scenes in Wellington, but the opposite may well be the case.

To see highlighted the stark contrast between a responsible and democratically elected government on the one hand, and the violence, anarchism and extremism of their critics on the other, may well have worked in the government’s favour; if that is the choice we must make, the ordinary voter may say, we have no hesitation in firming up our support for democracy and law and order.

Nor is it the case that other political groupings will have done themselves much good. David Seymour, gadfly that he is, has tried to ingratiate himself with the demonstrators. He is, after all, entirely poll-driven, and is terrified of being outflanked on the right. He will happily abandon sensible middle opinion if that is what is needed to hang on to the support he hopes to gain from the extreme right.

Nor has Christoper Luxon, for the National party, cut a particularly impressive figure. He has hoped to profit from the government’s difficulties and has therefore refrained from helping them by appealing to traditional New Zealand values – the values that National is supposed to represent. On the other hand, he has recognised that to be seen to be condoning the actions and threats of the demonstrators would be electoral suicide.

As a consequence, he has been left to flap his hands ineffectually – a mere spectator rather a contributor to a solution. There was little sign here of the ability, shown in spades by the Prime Minister, to stay calm and hold the line in the face of the most extreme pressure.

Political bias in news reporting can take a variety of forms – as today’s Herald demonstrates.

The front page headline over an article written by an Auckland university economics professor reads, “Don’t Buy the Baloney Over Unemployment Insurance”. The headline appears with a large photograph of Grant Robertson, the Minister of Finance, who has recently introduced a new unemployment insurance scheme.

Many readers who don’t want to plough through an academic article on unemployment insurance will see only the headline; they will, not unnaturally, get the impression that the article is critical of the Minister’s proposal.

In fact, the article commends the proposal and rebuts the criticisms that the National party and others have made of it. The Herald’s readers have been poorly served, do you not think?