A rejuvenated Green Party caucus says it could work with National on climate and violence protection policy, and that Wellington voters have endorsed light rail.
The 14 successful Green candidates met at Parliament on Wednesday morning for a photo and press conference with co-leaders James Shaw and Marama Davidson.
Election 2023 was a partial success for the party. It gained four extra list seats, seven fresh members, and flipped two Wellington electorates.
Shaw said this should send a message to the incoming National government that voters in the city support light rail and other Green-adjacent transport plans.
Former councillor Tamatha Paul won Wellington Central, former associate transport minister Julie Anne Genter won Rongotai, and the city also elected a Green mayor last year.
Despite the blue wave sweeping electorates, Labour’s Greg O’Connor held onto Ōhāriu. This could be interpreted as an endorsement of left-leaning transport plans.
Shaw said he was hoping National would listen to the “democratic will of Wellingtonians” and support the city’s ambition to build mass rapid transit, such as light rail.
“The National Party said they would be more focused on localism and ensuring local councils were able to focus on their priorities,” he told reporters.
“But then they said they didn't care what Wellington thought, and they were going to drill some holes in Mount Victoria regardless of what local representation thought.”
Let’s get Wellington driving
National’s transport policy document said the Let’s Get Wellington Moving programme had lost its social licence and residents just wanted action.
It will build a second tunnel for two additional car lanes and a separated area for walking and cycling above the road, instead. This will be funded as a State Highway project, and would allow for a faster moving bus network.
“There are a range of cost-effective and sensible projects which should be being advanced as priorities to get the city moving, rather than expensive vanity projects like light rail,” it said.
Waka Kotahi recently bought a piece of land on the Basin Reserve that could be necessary for the light rail project, and the high density housing it would enable.
However, it told The Post it was not proactively purchasing property for the project — which is likely to be scrapped or re-invented.
The Green Party might be able to make a case that voters support light rail in Wellington but it is much harder to argue the same thing in Auckland.
Few of the suburbs set to benefit from the light rail project actually voted for Labour.
The Green’s won Auckland Central, Epsom voted for Act, Mount Albert is still undecided, while Mount Roskill and Maungakiekie turned blue. Only Māngere had a decisive Labour win.
It was hardly a resounding endorsement of the $14 billion tunnelled light rail project, but perhaps support could be rallied for the Greens/Wayne Brown’s cheaper surface rail option.
National plans to scrap light rail and focus on three mass transit bus routes, which it says would be easier to deliver. None are a direct replacement for the light rail proposal, however.
Questioning leadership
Neither James Shaw nor Marama Davidson would commit to staying on as co-leaders for the full Parliamentary term and into the next election.
Shaw and Davidson have operated as a tight-knit team and have a complementary set of skills. It is possible that the two could resign together and allow a new duo to take over.
The pair said those decisions would be made sometime “in the future” once the newly elected members had had a chance to settle into Parliament.
“We’ve got a big new caucus and the primary focus right now is to ensure everyone gets their feet under the table and that we get off to a good start,” Shaw told reporters.
He noted the party, “somewhat famously”, holds an election for co-leaders at its general meeting each year and the next would be in June or July.
Shaw unexpectedly faced a leadership challenge at the 2022 general meeting, when a group of party activists voted to reopen nominations for his spot at the top of the party.
The activists had hoped this would create a vacuum that allowed some other senior party figure to put themselves forward. But it didn’t happen and Shaw was reelected easily.
Possible candidates included Teanau Tuiono, who has been returned to Parliament, and Elizabeth Kerekere who quit the party earlier this year.
Julie Anne Genter ran for the leadership against Marama Davidson in 2018, but only received one-third of the votes.
Meanwhile, Chloe Swarbrick has become one the country’s best-known politicians and could likely take on the leadership, if she wanted it.
She is popular with the public but, unlike Shaw and Genter, she also has strong support within the Green Party membership.
Tamatha Paul, the newly-elected representative for Wellington Central, was recruited by Swarbrick and is considered to be a close ally.
The Greens also endorsed Efeso Collins in the Auckland mayoral race, a decision made by the party’s Auckland chapter but likely involved input from Swarbrick.
Notably, Kerekere’s departure from the party came after she (seemingly) criticised the Auckland Central MP and appeared to involve a behind the scenes struggle over list placing.
To the extent that factions exist in the Green Party, Swarbrick seems to be on the winning side.
Green New Deal?
National has committed to New Zealand’s 2030 and 2050 climate targets but is heading into government with two parties, ACT and NZ First, that do not support either goal.
Leader Christopher Luxon and climate spokesperson Simon Watts have both said the Zero Carbon Act would not be up for negotiation and climate action would continue.
It was Shaw who introduced the bill to Parliament and worked to win the National Party’s support. It ultimately passed unanimously, because Act’s David Seymour missed the vote.
The Green Party co-leader said National had committed to the emission reduction targets but wouldn’t have the policy mix or coalition support to actually achieve them.
“It's going to be an interesting circle for them to square,” he told reporters.
In 2009, National and the Greens signed a Memorandum of Understanding which allowed the two parties to work together on a home insulation and energy efficiency strategy.
Luxon could choose to collaborate with the Green Party on both climate and family violence prevention, which Davidson has worked on, as an alternative to Act and NZ First.
This wouldn’t be a confidence and supply agreement, just support for specific initiatives.
Davidson said fighting climate change and preventing violence was good for all New Zealanders and she hoped National would recognise their expertise in those areas.
But Shaw said neither party had reached out to talk about it yet. The memorandum with the Key government in 2009 wasn’t formed until six months after the election.
“If there is anything like that kind of arrangement, it will be something for the future. They have to stick together, what is obviously going to be, a very awkward coalition in the meantime,” he said.
When reporters asked if the pair had a message for Luxon and Seymour about working with Winston Peters, Davidson answered: “Thoughts and prayers”.
The new Green MPs are: ecologist Lan Pham, chief executive Hūhana Lyndon, campaigner Steve Abel, councillor Efeso Collins, project manager Scott Willis, scientist Darleen Tana, and councillor Tamatha Paul.
58 Comments
Communication "Spandau Ballet" ....roll the audio....cue the 27 questions and action.... lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wS1svPVRUa8
...Can we get a wave ?......Thats a wrap....lol
Unfortunately for the Greens, a large and important segment of National’s support, the rural community has a rather jaundiced view of them but all the same National would not be ill advised to recognise the expertise James Shaw has in his field of climate etc by keeping at least a line of dialogue open with him. Beyond that the Greens would need to persuade National to forget the often open hostility that they have displayed towards them, as quickly as they appear to have done so themselves.
Luxon commited to climate goals? Only if he can do it on the cheap and at the same time support policies that raise emissions. A commitment to smoke and mirrors only. He'll be living it up on the parliamentary pension and rental income by the time for consequences.
If the greens had any sort of environmental credentials they might me useful. They used to, but in their current state they are a bunch of useless, racist, communist non thinkers. A pointless group or no hopers that attract similar people as their voting base. Best ignored until such time as they change their ways and they’re thinking…..and get rid of that awful Davison woman. Much more acceptable with Rob and Jeanette at the help. Now just losers.
agree on most of your point, except, regardless how pointless the party is or how dangerous their idealism, I'd wish National take the climate and social justice issue seriously. those group of people maybe wrong on how to address the issue, but issue itself are important to us all.
The Greens can hop on the bus and join the new Centre Right Government any time the like, it going to take them where they won’t be comfortable.
Be tough for them to digest the changes coming.
if they were smart ( and they are not ) they be in every government with a green agenda but their extreme socialist views keep them in the dark ages.
The irony is that even the Greens aren't addressing our ecological/existential issue(s). Although one or two could get there from here.
But in that light, they're light years ahead of the blue dinosaurs who will blunder the next term away.
I look at what is breaking globally - and it's pretty much what the Limits to Growth Standard Run tells you would break - and I know that real global growth is over. Yet those blue-leader clowns both still advocate it. Sure, they say whatever has to be said while they're feathering the nests of the already-rich - but what's breaking will destroy the accounting-system. Do they not realise?
Rhetorical question; realisation has some bottom-line prerequisites....
Limits to Growth Standard Run - was it a chicken (little) run?
(Reuters) -U.S. crude oil production climbed to a record 13.2 million barrels per day last week, government data showed on Thursday, topping the previous peak set in 2020
FAO Cereal Supply and Demand Brief
Global cereal production set to reach a record high in 2023
https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-oil-eia-milestones/us-crude-oil-pro…
Yeah, Nah. Positive feedback loop - our crops are loving the extra juice we are giving them.
"...It is in this low-CO2 world that humans evolved. A low-CO2
world has important implications for photosynthesis
because, as also will be shown, it led to CO2 starvation
of C3 plants and their replacement by plants using the C4
photosynthetic pathway which is more efficient in CO2
starved conditions."
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.1998.0198
profile,
You are getting desperate now. The Royal Soc. article was published in 1998 and then, many including myself, were sceptics, but the world has moved on. As we know from the Keeling Curve and other sources, CO2 levels have continued rising and the curve has steepened. Yes, more CO2 does produce greening and we are seeing that, but we are also seeing increased stress around water-either too much or not enough and pests. Look at what is happening in the boreal forests for example. Wildfires are increasing and with an intensity never seen before and this is releasing enormous quantities of CO2-in the billions of tonnes.
Yes, in some places the additional CO2 will help, but are you really saying that the more the merrier? That say 500ppm would be better and 600ppm better still? If so, then quite simply, you're nuts.
Interesting logic Linklater. Water stress and pests are up but also crop yields? The yield data is not backing up your assertions. There is a very clear link between global greening and CO2 and recent CO2 starvation is well documented. May want to look back a bit further time for you fire assumptions also.
"However, important exceptions aside, the quantitative evidence available does not support these perceived overall trends. Instead, global area burned appears to have overall declined over past decades, and there is increasing evidence that there is less fire in the global landscape today than centuries ago. ...Analysis of charcoal records in sediments [31] and isotope ratio records in ice cores [32] suggest that global biomass burning during the past century has been lower than at any time in the past 2000 years." https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27216515/
Rubbish. Farmers are getting more efficient by the year. This isn't the 1950's. Try reading up on precision agriculture or zero till and learn something? Urbanisation and ignorance is increasing exponentially it seems!
"Average application rates in the 1950s were 1,200, 1,700, and 2,400 grams of active ingredient used per hectare for fungicides, insecticides, and herbicides respectively. By the 2000s the average use rates of newly introduced products were reduced to 100, 40, and 75 g/ha respectively – about 95% lower on average."
NZ green party is really a social justice party rather than an environmental party. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, I'd just like to have the option of a more centrist party that can be kingmaker for environmental issues. Winston is deplorable in many ways but he does seem to know how to play mmp.
It’s interesting Dame Tariana Turia interviewed today in NZH explains how productive it was working with John Key & Bill English during her time as Associate Health Minister. Quite appropriately, she has refrained from this comment until after the election. Surely her words demonstrate the advantage of being able to position yourselves inside of the tent rather than outside. As it stands TPM have gained more seats, as too the Greens, but really they are confined to barking at cars from their respective backyards. I do hope though that Dr Shane Reti enlists all the expertise and advice available from this great Lady and similar direction on offer.
Would be interesting seeing National trying to work with even a "primarily environmental" party, though. What if the primarily environmental party suggests a user-pays approach to the clean-up costs of all pollution, for example? This would cut squarely across NACT's preference for socialising the cost of pollution.
National and the Greens could govern without a 3rd party .
The only way the greens delegates would go for it is on the grounds Act is neutralised.
The family violence angle is interesting, I would say to get Davidson on board.
No one is going to be happy, for the greens it's about achieving what they can for the environment while in opposition.
For National it would be avoiding a Act/ NZF tanty requiring a early election.
If National had told its voters to vote Raf, then he could have won Ilam and brought in a couple more MPs too. Basically the 2% TOP vote would have gone to the TOPNACT coalition instead of being wasted, and that would have got them across the line. Even if Luxon didn't go with TOP, it would give him much better bargaining power with Winnie, Winnie would not be in the kingmaker position.
In 2020 the Greens were all agog at the prospect of real cabinet seats at long last. So much so that Davidson was demanding one for herself on election night. But the electorate thwarted them. All National governments have lasted 3 or more terms. This one, who knows, but the Greens have just realised that not only are they way further back in left field, the gate is heavily padlocked. Therefore friendly little offerings are suddenly all the rage.
The Greens should split into two parties: an environmental lobby, who will co-govern with the majority and hold them accountable to environment issues like recycling, climate, electrification etc, and the left wing progressive economists and social development group who stay on the left.
I would happily vote for the former, I won't vote for the latter.
I think James Shaw and Brooke Van V are two very talented politicians and would like to see them in government for a long time. Sadly, Shaw is held back by the socialists, who attack any form of compromise. Protestors dont make good governments. I think he might even defect one day. I'm yet to hear Marama and Chloe offer any viable solutions at all, just ranting.
"I would happily vote for the former, I won't vote for the latter" - a common sentiment among the right, but is it true? Would you have voted green this election if they were just environmentalists? Or would you have voted for a right wing party to prevent the left getting in?
Likewise I could vote legalise cannabis in theory because I don't see a reason for it to be illegal, but if I did then I wouldn't get to vote left or right so I didn't.
Blue Green parties have never come close to 5 % in previous elections.
Part of the reason the Greens promote social issues , is because not many people vote for environmental reasons alone .
I guess if you look at around 50% voting to legalise dope , but the legalise party getting around 1% , NZ'ers have never been single issue voters in a big way.
Likewise , despite all the noise from the covid mandate etc parties , none of those partie got more than 1.5 %.
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