It’s the battle of the teeth
Oh for the love of Christ, the Greens have torn up the Memorandum of Understanding and are running in the Mt Albert by-election.
It’s such a stupid decision and shows the naked ambition of Julie Anne Genter to get an Auckland electorate. The lesson from Mt Roskill was that when the options are limited, the vote for change is there. In a bloody election year the voters are looking for unity, standing two high ranking MPs against each other is a recipe for friction and disunity.
This decision to run throws up in the air any real co-ordination at the 2017 election where there are number of electorates which should only have one MP stand. The lack of maturity to work together has always been the problem for Labour and the Greens and allowing this shows up what amateurs the Greens really are.
The possibility for this to cause all sorts of ructions are immense, Green activists online are about as alienating as the PSA Wellington comms team and Labour supporters won’t bite their tongue, they’ll have a go.
It’s such needless home goal and now Julie Anne Genter is running, Gareth Morgan would be a fool to not run and perhaps come through the middle.
This is why you can’t trust Labour and the Greens to win an election, personal ambition and ego politics always trump what’s best for NZ.
This will end badly just as Labour+Greens are neck and neck with National. God these people are clowns.
National will be laughing.
The real problem is Shearer walking away, bitter I assume, months out from an election creating the by-election in the first place.
The memorandum did not stipulate every seat and since the Nat’s have thrown the towel in the Greens can run a candidate to raise her profile, PR and to look like they give a shit and I believe they do.
The electorate will get solid left messages all the way to voting day and that can’t be a bad thing.
Honestly if they weren’t in the game the by-election would be even more farcical and the turn out could slump to nothing.
Anyway is Genter not eyeing up Auckland Central?
Well said.
+1 XRAY
And how is this not simply “naked ambition” on the part of Jacinda Ardern. After all, if Genter wins, the Green obtain an extra seat in Parliament, albeit at Labour’s expense.
No they don’t, their list MP becomes an electorate MP, that’s all. Potentially there would be a new Labour MP from Labour’s list.
How is this not “naked ambition” on the part of Jacinda Ardern? Why wouldn’t Genter want to win an extra seat for her party in any case? Labour on the other hand obtains no extra seats if Jacinda wins.
This is bull shit. Sometimes you”Te a ranter Martyn.
The MoU doesn’t include deals over seats. If Genter can win it (and that’s unlikely), it would be great for the Progressive block.
More likely that the Greens and Labour will use the Mt Albert campaign to demonstrate that together they are a strong stable alternative government in waiting. Also that they can work cooperatively while having some differences in policy.
+1 RIC
Bring back the McGillicuddy Serious Party !!!!
Jeez, Bomber, get a grip. There will be a bielection whether Greens stand or not. This is their chance to demonstrate what the MOU means in action. Thank God you’re not running!
Word bro
In the coming general election there will be both Labour and Green candidates in all (or nearly all) seats. They will run a friendly campaign, both candidates talking about a Labour/Green government, and spelling out the similarities and differences between Labour and the Greens.
It will be exactly the same in the Mt Albert by-election. There doesn’t need to be any “disunity”, rather two good candidates proving there can be unity with diversity, by two parties, in government.
Clearly, Mt Roskill was different, with a public perception that there could be a close contest between National and Labour. So the Greens didn’t run. National is not running in Mt Albert – so no candidate other than the Labour or Green candidate can win.
You are wrong that National will be “laughing”, or benefit. In fact, National will lose out. Without a Green candidate the by-election would have largely been ignored by the media. Now there will be useful public attention on the Labour and Green policies and how they compare.
+1 KEITH LOCKE
Just tell them to “Piss off!” Or has that byline already been used?
Just pull their ponytails and tell them to keep quiet? Or has that tactic already been used?
Just tell lies, act smug, listen to the polls and it will be alright? Or has that strategy already been used?
Just get them to sit in the changing shed of a big sporting fixture and neck a Steinie! Or has that photo-op already been used?
In the immortal words of George Orwell’s Animal Farm
“You don’t want
JonesKey to come back do you?”Or doesn’t it matter that Key has gone, the best mana from electoral heaven for a left-wing bloc, the gilt-edged Golden Ticket to win an election and redress 33 years of cancerous neoliberalism?
Do you really want to win a fucking election in less than a year? If you do this in Mt Albert – God help the left!
BTW, isn’t Julie Anne Genter from the same country as John Palino, Luigi Wewegi and Donald Trump?
I think she’s Canadian originally.
Please explain why the accent of the politician affects the quality of the ideas that he or she promotes?
@ Wha Left, this is from the Green Party website.
Julie’s story
Growing up in Los Angeles made Julie Anne recognise early in life that transport and urban design have a profound impact on the way we live. She graduated from UC Berkeley with a BA and studied Politics at the prestigious Sciences Po Paris, before moving to New Zealand as a scholar at the University of Auckland, where she gained a Masters of Planning Practice with First Class Honours. She went on to work as a transport consultant at some of New Zealand’s leading firms, undertaking ground-breaking research in transport economics and urban design.
By lumping Julie in with John Palino, Luigi Wewegi and Donald Trump Wha Left, you are implying that she is part of some sort of corporate takeover or corrupt US influence on New Zealand. Many great things have come out of the USA and to tar all Americans because of the foibles of a few colourful characters is unfair.
ACT, can work with the Greens after the next election, because there are natural synergies between the parties. The bottom line would be that the Greens rescind its MOU with Labour and embrace a user-pays approach to the environment.
User-pays is a US export, that has transformed New Zealand into one of the leading first world economies. ACT could work with another export from the US, Julie Anne Genter.
“User-pays is a US export, that has transformed New Zealand into one of the leading first world economies. ACT could work with another export from the US, Julie Anne Genter.”
User pays has led to our students becoming highly indebted in student loan debt, has led to the poor being locked out of many services that cost cash on the palm, and turned more into beggars in society.
New Zealand is based on a fake economy, one propped up by high immigration, hiding low real growth on per capita basis. Add the housing speculation and tourists coming here to be served by servile New Zealanders and imported cheap labour, and you have that BS “leading” economy, which is a house of cards.
Your charm offensive towards Julie Ann Genter is again a mischievous attempt to confuse and annoy readers and commenters here.
Meanwhile you hide the fact that ACT has NO talent itself in Parliament, just a grandstanding wannabe smart arsed expert and opinionated jerk called David You Know What His Name Is.
What difference does it make what country she was born in? She’s a NZ citizen, probably more patriotic than any of us who were born in NZ, as she chose to become a citizen of NZ. If you really are interested there is a wikipedia entry for her, which will tell you all you need to know about where she came from.
Does Jacinda Adern (Labour), support the ‘White Helmets’ in Aleppo, Syria?
Julie Anne Genter (Green Party) supports the ‘White Helmets’ in Aleppo, Syria.
(I heard her say so last Saturday, at the anti-Assad / anti-Russia demonstration at Aotea Square.)
Seems that Joe Carolan is not opposed to the ‘White Helmets’ in Aleppo, Syria?
As a voter in the Mt Albert by-election, who supports the democratic right of the majority of citizens of the sovereign Nation State of Syria, to choose their own ‘regime’ – this in my view, pivotal issue regarding world peace, is very important to me.
Penny Bright
me too penny
I find it interesting that the huge majority of civilians evacuated from Eastern Aleppo have chosen to go to govt held western Aleppo.
The so called ‘rebels” and their supporters have gone to Al Nusra dominated Idlib, where secular Syrian law has been thrown out and sharia courts set up.Democracy and freedom dont come in to it.
I find the Green’s credulity and belief in what we’re told by a degraded media a real turn off
+100 to that !…FRANCESCA
…isnt Julie Anne Genter an American?…Her support for the ‘White Helmets’ and “anti-Assad / anti-Russia demonstration” is disturbing to say the least !
…and certainly not of the NZ Greens as I knew them!
Golly, I wonder if that might be because the government are bombing eastern Allepo and not western Allepo?
+100 Penny…interesting…re ‘White Helmets’…this from women on the ground…seems like the ‘White Helmets’..are NOT knights in shining armour out to save people but have other agendas
https://www.rt.com/shows/crosstalk/361887-white-helmets-aid-pr/
“The White Helmets: a heartfelt humanitarian NGO or an elaborate and cynical Western PR stunt promoting illegal regime change in Syria? Does wearing white helmets mean they are the good guys supporting a just cause?
CrossTalking with Vanessa Beeley, Eva Bartlett, and Patrick Henningsen.”
Chooky, RT.com is a Russian media network funded by the Russian government. As such, it is as “free and fair” as the American pro-Republican, right-wing Fox News. According to former Rt reporters, it is mostly a mouthpiece for Putin’s government; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT_(TV_network)
It may be that, Frank, but more importantly, it is also a mouthpiece for dissenting voices in the West, those normally ignored by the MSM.
Frank and you are both right. They like to present dissenting views in western countries, as that serves the Russian government’s agenda to weaken the EU and so.
Then we come to the daily blog to try and make sense off this shit show.
Clump
@ Frankl MACSKASY…did you even watch that?! ( or are you just mouthing propaganda against RT?!)
I make up my own mind thanks!…and I have a good eye for dumb propaganda!
…these are non Russian women on the ground in Syria who have observed the ‘White Helmets’ in action
Indeed, with the white helmets being so thoroughly discredited any support of them reveals either tacit support of the US/NATO proxy war or a very limited understanding of what is going on in Syria. Neither being good reasons to vote for someone.
“What is a Leppo?” comes to mind.
Just pay your rates Penny, show some responsibility to the community in which you are so pleased to live..
The MOU is not broken. This is only good for both parties to get their policies out and connect with local voters there. Everyone knows Bradbury will take any chance he can to have a dig at the Greens. This is yet again an unqualified and way under researched article. Very sad to see.
Perhaps if Jo was not putting his hand up to run against Labour there would not need to be a By-election and she would be in automatically (which is what happens when there is only one candidate according to the electoral commission). So if there has to be a by-election why not get your party’s policies and profile out in public as a lead up to the national election. (Personally I would have preferred National to have a spine and declare an early national election, but perhaps they are banking on left wing bloggers to attempt to sabotage the opposition like this blog appears to be attempting to do…)
Also – beware of Gareth Morgan – he’s happy to go into coalition with National he’s sated on Bfm… He believes in big business, despite his progressive policies he’s releasing. (He’s long said if he was in the Green party he would push to go into coalition with National).
Julie Ann Genter (aka “Gentry”) may be smart to a degree, but she has fallen for the charm offensive by Generation Zero, the aspiring elite of tomorrow, who own and live in comfy, upmarket apartments near the city, throw parties and go on about how environmentally friendly they are, while they earn salaries that afford them the better grown organic food that the ordinary folks cannot even afford to look at.
If that is the future, and if the Auckland Unitary Plan, being a dream playground for developers and property speculators, is supposed to solve our housing problems, then we may as well bury all hope for social justice for the future.
The “green” label has become a fake label, same as the “social” one, even the Nats now go on about how “social” they have been while not cutting benefits during the GFC. It is all just fad stuff now, to appeal to the voters across the board, like selling a feel good factor.
Both candidates by Labour and the Greens carry such fake labels, I fear, they are not honestly committed to the radical kind of change we really need, they offer tweaks to the system, nothing more, just more “feel good stuff”.
So Mt Albert may need a Gareth Morgan challenge after all, but the cat lovers will NOT vote for him, that is what I consider.
We already know that it will not make a scrap of difference who stands or who wins because all mainstream political parties have exactly the same basic policies:
1. Maintain the control that banks and corporations have over NZ society.
2. Never mention any of the fundamental issues that will bring the entire system down in a matter of few years.
3. Make no preparations whatsoever for the inevitable collapse of present living arrangements.
4. Keep pretending that present living arrangements have a future.
It therefore follows that the kind of politics that is practiced in NZ (and most other place) is very much part of the problem and is only capable of making matters worse faster, which is exactly what we have witnessed over several decades, and is what will eventually annihilate us.
https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/wp-content/plugins/sio-bluemoon/graphs/mlo_two_years.png
It’s healthy to have multiple candidates standing.
Although I don’t live in the Mt Albert electorate, as a JAFA, if I had the choice of Jacinda Ardern and Julie Anne Genter, my vote would go with Genter.
Being the Greens’ transport spokesperson who knows her stuff, she is a very strong advocate for improving Auckland’s transport system, through introducing a comprehensive rail system, something this city needs more than anything else and Genter can see this. With the mass migration into the super city, the infrastructure is failing badly under the growing heavy traffic volume, mainly due to a lack of a constructive public transport system.
# Go Julie Anne Genter.
I assume Julie Anne Genter will also run in Mt Albert in the general election because not running will prove she had no commitment to Mt Albert at all and was just ‘having a go’. This would be a complete insult to any Green supporters in that electorate.
question gareth’s motives, dont just assume he is what he presents, he is attempting and succeeding in some regard to play new zealanders, for example the whole cat thing is classic playing the system, a question strategically chosen that will divide and polarize opinions to increase his profile and general consciousness of ‘gareth’ the ‘scam’ of him and don brash setting themselves up in opposition where brash (knowingly unlikable) set him self up as appearing anti maori and gareth the pro maori guy that no maori had ever heard of all to position himself, its fake and manipulation, he is a fraud, he has read or been trained like key on how to play the public – hes watched the usa elections and will most likely set himself up as a fake bernie or fake trump or a mix of the 2, dont buy it, just saying for the record xD
Yes- I remember back in 1984 when Bob Jones’s Party split the vote and greased the way for Roger Douglas and his cuckoo party to start this neoliberal scourge on New Zealand. From Wikipedia:
“The New Zealand Party operated as a political party in New Zealand from 1983 to about 1986. Established by millionaire property tycoon Bob Jones, the party promoted both social and economic liberalization. The New Zealand Party’s motto was “Freedom and Prosperity”, and it has sometimes been classified[by whom?] as libertarian (although that term is not particularly common in New Zealand). It failed to win any seats in Parliament, but purportedly played a role in causing the defeat of Robert Muldoon’s National Party government in the 1984 election by splitting the vote (i.e. as a spoiler).
And Gareth Morgan is just another self-centred rich-prick, who wants to keep this neoliberal scourge going and squeezing the last few ounces of money out of teh poor and into the pockets of the rich.
You only have to look at Morgan’s self-serving attitudes when he wanted to contribute to buying back the Abel Tasman beach, as long as he got exclusive rights to the buildings
http://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/themes/beaches/76930224/gareth-morgan-manipulates-buy-the-beach-crowd
If Gareth Morgan splits the vote in 2017, who will benefit?
No Nats, NZ First, Act or the One-Man Band so this would’ve been a fight between Labour and Joe Carolan’s splitter cult. Good on the Greens for at least giving this some semblance of a contest.
Oh Lordy! Trust the left to fall about arguing while Rome burns…
So was it worth it Martyn?
Or is this a little Christmas Troll? 🙂
Get a fucking grip Bradbury
There is nothing in the MOU to stop the Greens running in the by election.
Your anti Green hysteria is getting a bit much.
It is the bloody crazies in National who think that climate change translates as “drill baby, drill!” We should be opposing.
Sharp political differences cannot be overcome by organisational means.
I do not share your dark view Martyn of this move by the Green Party (and Labour).
In fact I see it as an opportunity.
It is an undeniable fact that if the National government is to be defeated the Green Party and the Labour Party must work together.
While the MOU is a move in the right direction, it had some serious flaws, that were just simply papered over but still remain and seriously need to be sorted out.
If not, these differences threaten to explode back into the open at any time, and as is likely, at the worst possible time.
If these differences can be brought out into the open and discussed in a collegiate and respectful debate, the possibility is opened up for the MOU to be put on a surer footing.
The Mt. Albert by-election, provides the Labour and the Green Party a unique opportunity to bring out these differences and put them before the electorate and the public in a non-destructive way.
We (I mean all of us), are facing the biggest problem we have ever had to face. If we as a species don’t do something soon the bio-sphere that sustains us and our fellow creatures will be irreparably damaged.
That problem is of course, climate change.
Currently no country in the world is prepared to provide the political leadership necessary to properly address this problem. And New Zealand is no exception, Even though, of all the countries of the world we are probably best placed to give that lead.
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-27122016/#comment-1279981
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-27122016/#comment-1279981
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