If Jacinda Ardern or ay of her Auckland-based cabinet ministers stepped outside this weekend, they would have realised that this afternoon’s cabinet decision on whether to move Auckland back to Level 1 has already been made. The residents of our biggest city have voted with their feet.

While some places where more than 100 might gather seemed to make an effort (in some churches singing was still forbidden), in large part the city went about its business as usual. Anecdotally and from my experience, people jostled past each other in the malls, hardware stores and streets with barely a consideration for the Covid pandemic.

It’s a sign of the care our political leaders must take through 2021, as we navigate what we hope is the climb back down the Covid mountain.

I haven’t written much about Covid because, in short, the voices that matter at this time know way more about science than I do. But the politics of this remain fascinating.

The Labour government - and the fact that we have a Labour government, rather than a Labour-led government - leans heavily on the key decisions made about a year ago, as in the dim light of those early Covid days, the decision-makers at the top of the administration decided to ‘go hard and go early’ with an eradication approach. In a remote island nation, it seemed worth the risk. And it has proved pretty successful over all.

Since then the political management has been, well, patchy. We all know about the failure to test staff at the border, the poor security measures at some MIQ facilities, the government’s hesitancy to make some tough decisions, such as mask-wearing on public transport and now widespread saliva testing.

It’s interesting to note that Labour has quietly adopted a couple of prevention measures it mocked before last years election. The pre-testing of arrivals coming from America and Britain is one example. And Labour seems to have no qualms about continuing the use the 1pm briefings for political purposes when it suits them, while turning down repeated requests for one-on-one interviews from a range media.

On the upside the messaging remains clear and concise. The use of bluetooth seems to be making a practical difference. And the MIQ facilities, while still short of the rules being applied in Australia, are working relatively well.

But this weekend in Auckland underlined how hard it is going to be manage public behaviour from here on in. After a happy and free summer, New Zealanders as a crowd have essentially decided we’ve come out the other side already. You could already see that in the tracing app apathy (app-athy!). But it has come into sharp focus. Last week’s lockdown was only three days and was a gnat-sized lockdown compared to what much of the rest of the world is suffering. Still, it hurt Auckland - the quick notice made it hard for families with school-aged children and businesses took at hit in the midst of summer events. But more to the point, Aucklanders weren’t happy.

You might say it’s nothing to be proud of and is, well, a bit pathetic. We haven’t bounced in and out of lockdowns like so many other countries. But we are now seeing the law of diminishing returns kick in. Every time we go into lockdown, more and more people are taking it less and less seriously.

The fact is that after their two extra lockdowns, level 2 simply doesn’t exist in Auckland any more. If residents aren’t locked away, they will behave as if it’s 2019. We’re losing touch with a cautious middle-ground and the government will need to be even more careful to read the public mood in the year ahead. Each time we come out of a lockdown, fewer people are willing to go back in. Every lockdown reduces the public willingness to comply with the next one. And there’s danger in that.

As wonderful as the arrival of the vaccine is, that only goes to amplify the feelings of many, that we’re fine, the worst is over and we can stop worrying. Think of it this way: How many New Zealanders could even tell you the difference between levels 1, 2 and 3 these days? We’ve gone right off the boil.

The simple truth is that for all that we’ve done right over the past six months or so, we’ve all done plenty wrong and it’s only luck that has got us through without a wider spread of the virus.

As Sir Edmund Hillary used to say, coming down the mountain is just as important and dangerous as climbing up. So the government has a challenging few months ahead as it tries to lead the ‘team of five million’ into a different mindset. It will need to take a super-spreader approach to the vaccine, getting it out urgently. And it will need to somehow get a new message through to New Zealanders. Not just ‘stay home’ or ‘wash your hands’, but rather how to live with a new normal that enjoys the freedoms we’ve won, but does not pretend that the country is as fine and dandy as Aucklanders seemed to believe this weekend.