Latest Green u-turn on Welfare & Winston highlights terror of China

By
Martyn Bradbury
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18
9

James Shaw and his strategy team.

Two political news stories went unnoticed last week which give an insight to the power structures and fears within the new Government.

The first was the latest capitulation to reason by the Greens who have this inane habit if zigging when they should be zagging and zagging when they should be zigging.

They have capitulated on abolishing benefit sanctions…

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Greens back down on abolishing all benefit sanctions

The Green Party has scrapped one of its core election promises championed by former co-leader Metiria Turei.

The party no longer believes in immediately abolishing all financial sanctions and obligations on beneficiaries.

It was forced to back down on the policy during coalition negotiations with Labour, which adjusted the wording so only “excessive” sanctions will be removed.

“Our policy is what the Government’s policy is. So now we’re in Government, we need to do what Government policy says,” says co-leader James Shaw.

“We only want to get rid of the most excessive sanctions,” he added.

The policy u-turn means the Greens will be able to support Shane Jones’ plan to sanction beneficiaries who refuse to work on the Government’s ‘Plant a Billion Trees’ project.

…this back down is because the Greens have managed to utterly blow any political leverage they had since the new Government was sworn in. This is punishment for attempting to threaten Labour & NZ First over the Waka Jumping legislation, meaning the Greens stand for the poor and beneficiaries in general has been wasted on immature power grabs.

What should have happened was the Greens should have publicly announced the immediate dispatch of Marama Davidson to Willie Jackson as the Minister of Employment and Welfare Minister Carmel Sepuloni to begin pushing carrots over sticks before Christmas for beneficiaries.

Those two Ministers would be far more open to Green ideas on dismantling this structural cruelty and the Greens could have taken some credit and had something to show those beneficiaries who were inspired to vote for them by Metiria’s brave announcement.

As it stands the Greens have lost their leverage and disappointed beneficiaries. The Greens need to spend these holidays to try and come up with a new tactics team because they are continuing to go backwards.

The other huge story was Winston’s remarkably soothing public words towards China which highlights the intense concern the new Government view the existential threat of China and how attuned they are to not offend China.

The new Government are well aware of how the National Party were bought out by Chinese business interests and they are aware of how much damage China could cause the NZ economy.

The latest GCSB threat list was censored because it referred to China and NZ First’s sudden move to sell our dairy to Russia was off the back of a threat by China to not buy our milk powder in response to the new Governments plans to stop foreigners buying land here.

Pacifying China until the new government can detach our economy from China’s dominance by replacing dairy with forestry and greater industry diversification will be a big challenge but Winston has the skill to pull it off while the Greens must adapt or die if they want to remain politically relevant post 2020.

 

18 COMMENTS

  1. “What should have happened was the Greens should have publicly announced the immediate dispatch of Marama Davidson to Willie Jackson as the Minister of Employment and Welfare Minister Carmel Sepuloni to begin pushing carrots over sticks …”

    Indeed, Martyn.

    Furthermore, push for these new Government created jobs to pay a living wage.

  2. It is sad that the greens did a u turn on sanctions because most of those have stopped people from receiving income that they so really need. Some of those sanctions do with house hunting and if you don’t have internet to find a place or money for bus fare to go to see the real estates agencies, or credit on your phone to call them, your benefit gets sanction because you did not go house hunting.
    There are people who have been sanction even though they told work and income that they are either out on a job interview organised by one of the case managers of which not all of the case manager knows because they either don’t read notes on their computers or someone has not put them in.
    These sanctions’ have to go.

    • Little or Ardern? Ardern or Little? Trying to decide which Labour leader was better will trigger debate and tempers until New Zealand itself is but a memory.

      But ultimately, Andrew Little gets the nod, because he had a keener sense of the campaign realities of the War Between ideologies. Jacinda Ardern is a superb Prime Minister who masterfully defeated a series of hapless National Party wannabes, and held her own to the bitter end against Bill English. Had Winston Peters accepted an offer to join the National Party, New Zealand’s worst political ideologies might have ended in months instead of 3 years.

      Yet winning elections doesn’t equate to winning ideologies, as Germany also learned in two world wars. To win, the Labour Party had to survive in the face of a stronger National Party and economic resources, until weariness induced Winston to accept Labours offer. For this to happen, the coalition needs to be strong-but only strong enough to parry business confidence and convince The National Party of the futility of their efforts.

      Every electorate fought by Ardern and The Labour Party, even if it made fools of internal power plays, Ardern and the support of SJW’s, was one more electorate that believed. Obviously, winning electorates is a path to the 9th floor. But to what end did Bill English and The National Party lead? The Party of Justice was not destroyed, The Cities and Regions were not transformed Blue to Red, and the battle of electorates goes on.

      Election2017 was no ones finest hour. The wrong ideology, at the wrong election, at the wrong time, and with the wrong leaders, was how Jacinda Ardern out negotiated Bill English.

      The nadir of Labour Party fortunes was Andrew Little stepping down as Leader of the Labour Party, when Steven Joyce’s arrogant and foolish drive for fiscal orthodoxy was exposed triggered a surprise MSM blow back. Surprised, desperate and unprepared, the National Party was Rudderless and with no support parties in sight.

      Fortunately, Andrew Little got rid of ABC’s and Jacinda was appointed Labour Leader, a noted Union lawyer and negotiator, Andrew Little understood what needed to be done to give Labour the best chance of election victory. Appalled by the defeatist narrative fever of Labour polling, Andrew Little demoted inadequate MP’s and demanded more from his MP’s. But for all his bellicosity, Andrew Littles tactics were methodical, sound and calibrated to the strengths of his team and the nation from which they came.

      Andrew Little launched carefully prepared and focused narratives that relied on maximum air time and put himself the middle to absorb the most absurd questions at minimum cost to his party. This may have lacked the elegant operational art of a Steven Joyce or Mike Williams or the grandiose goals of Winston Peters. But in the dark, where Green Party annihilation was possible conflicts amongst Labour, NZFirst and the Green Party had to be restricted, and Kiwi Voters were not ready to accept huge reforms, they were the right tactics at the right time.

  4. Winston should go full steam ahead to find other markets for NZ outside China…this is our right as a sovereign nation…Russia would be a good start for our dairy…and the EU and Britain

    Personally I think working for the dole ( topped up to a basic income) is a good idea…as long as people have some choice as to the work they wish to do…it can lead on to careers and long term employment

    …eg the PEP/TEP ? scheme …it gave people a chance to experience the workforce , the discipline of getting up to go to a job, training on the job, the satisfaction of doing a good job …. and the creds and experience and confidence to launch into future career opportunities and training…in some cases TEP or PEP employers offered the employee a permanent job and paid for further training outside the job eg extramural university accountancy or night classes or time off for polytech courses

    …young New Zealanders especially need hope…and they need jobs

    ( if we are to avoid poor mental health ,high suicide rates and drug addictions)

    Free Community Night Education Classes need to resume around the country ….for the sake of community social and generational cohesion…learning new skills…arts and languages, social skills etc

    the Nactional Government was evil in axing Community Night Education classes

    …and giving the money to private schools ie from those at the bottom of the socioeconomic heap and from communities that could least afford to further their lifelong education hopes to those who were the wealthiest and could afford private schools

  5. Two things for my bobs worth….
    1) The Greens do seem to be getting piss poor guidance at the moment.
    2) All this moaning about China without recognition about how fucked up the USA is is a bit pointless. Which one should we go with? We can’t continue to string along with both sides. Personally I think the USA has lost the plot totally since climbing out of the great depression and is leading the World into total annihilation.

  6. I honestly think, that the Green Party position during the election campaign, to do away with ‘all’ sanctions’ for those on benefits, was just another lolly bit as part of the lolly scramble game they played.

    They simply tried to attract as many voters on benefits, to vote for them, thus increasing their vote, or stabilising it, after Metiria was forced out.

    It would NEVER have been accepted as policy by Labour, even if Labour and Greens would have had the combined vote to govern without NZ First.

    So I am not surprised at this news.

    As for Winston’s regional development and forestry plans, I doubt it has that much to do with China, the Chinese may indeed be very interested in more timber from NZ Inc..

    To become more independent from China, New Zealand needs to diversify further, and develop more value added products with appealing brand names and ecological reputation.

    New Zealand must sell goods and services to more countries, and develop also better ties with nations in Latin America and Africa and so forth. The FTA with the EU is also a priority I think.

    That trade agreement Winston wants with Russia and a few former Soviet Block countries, that will just be one such effort, he would like to see completed. It would come with a big price tag though, I would not be surprised if that will be ditched too at some stage.

    There are somewhat limited opportunities for New Zealand on the global scene we have at present. Australia will always remain to be a major trading partner, and strategically important also, we cannot simply move these isles into another global region, we are stuck here, geographically. And Asia, particularly East and South East Asia will remain to be at our door step, like the Pacific Islands also, being less important in trade.

  7. Ah the Greens are being true to type. Middle class muddle class wankers trying to be ‘nice’ because we don’t need adversarial politics anymore. And when everyone screws them over they act so surprised and hurt and we didn’t see that coming.

    What a surprise, NOT.

    And please use correct English; how can you have a ‘co-leader’ when there is only ONE fucking leader?

    Geez don’t expect me to vote for ’em in 2020…

  10. People need to be patient HOW long have we had our new coalition government in power. Based on all the mess left behind they all need to be given a chance and take a big breath. They need to prioritise something our last government didn’t do. Based on the briefing papers made public there is much to do and where do you start.

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