By JOHN HARTEVELT - The Dominion Post 06/03/2010

OPINION: Goodness only knows what the girls were smiling about. Perhaps the prime minister's banana-shaped smile was infectious, but that couldn't explain the girls fainting.

No sooner had the red-blazered private school students at Lower Hutt's Chilton Saint James School recovered their poise than John Key was declaring the 15-year-olds among them were not fit to be allowed behind the wheel.

Then he started maligning the 30,000 teenagers who apparently bunk school each day. Then he said it should be easier for employers to get rid of troublesome employees (many of whom would be after-school job teenagers). Then he gave autographs.

Mr Key's Government has been pumping the "youth issues" vein all term, but it got a special priming this week. The formula is simple. There is an intrinsic conservative appeal to policies touted as either cracking down on slovenly and/or unruly youth or taking care of vulnerable youth. Neither are particularly welcomed by young people but both are vote-winners with parents.