Huge news over the week for two electorates.
Tamati Coffey’s decision to stand down from Waiariki cements a Māori Party win into place and removes any question they will return to Parliament.
No newly selected Labour candidate is in any position to seriously challenge Rawiri, but there is an enormous Party vote for Labour to harvest in Waiariki so Labour will run hard for that but I don’t think they can seriously think of winning it back.
That means the Māori Party are back and based on the last Roy Morgan Poll would hold the balance of power.
This is a huge development in the chess moves for the election.
Over in Mt Albert, Helen White has finally won an electorate she can win.
I think White is possibly the most smug candidate Labour has, remember her Finn Hogan interview during the 2020 election?
Helen’s main beef in that interview was why she had to bother explaining how much better than Chloe she is.
Watching her try and justify her Chloe slam is very Ok Karen.
It’s that odd situation where the more you see of a candidate, the less you like them.
Chloe by the way ended up winning Auckland Central just as I predicted.
What is amazing about Helen’s win as the candidate for Mt Albert was that Jacinda was backing Camilla Belich and even turned up to the Mt Albert vote with Camilla.
Helen’s ambition however is far larger than needing backing from Jacinda and her undeserved smugness is the exact same trait most people living in Mt Albert share with her so Candidate and Electorate are in perfect harmony on how important they think they both are.
Helen White not running in Auckland Central also gifts that electorate back to Chloe which when you consider the Greens scored 5.7% in the most recent Curia Poll should also lesson the pressure on Chloe.
What we can say for sure is that the Māori Party and the Greens are both returning to Parliament post the election.
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I’m would ask what the Maori Party and the Greens have done to make a difference in the lives of ordinary NZ people over the past few years .
Same can be said for ACT and National Trevor, seriously.
As an unreconstructed old tory of course you would “ask” that Trevor…Greens and TPM represent the future direction of this country–younger and browner, more environmentally aware and active. Many incremental reforms have occurred via Green input and they keep Climate Disaster on the public agenda. TPM operate in the parallel Māori world which you may be dimly aware of and have achieved a lot of capacity building and pan iwi co-operation via the COVID and post COVID period.
I would point out that NZ National scuttled hundreds of thousands of working class people with the 1991 union busting Employment Contracts Act and Ruth Richardson’s benefit slashing MOAB, ‘Mother of all budgets’. They have continued down the privatisation pro business role since their formation. So we know exactly what the Natzos have done to ordinary people.
NZ First back in Parliament as well. So it will be a full house. Just need TOP to have a cup of tea with Hipkins. So TOP can help NZ First with the hand brakes.
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