Green Party implosion in 5…4…3…2…

78
3693
Actual Green Party Caucus meeting

And it begins…

Green Party discontent: Members walk, ex-MPs criticise leadership

Former senior figures have accused the Greens of jettisoning core principles as party discontent surfaces over its co-operation agreement in government.

Ex-MPs Sue Bradford and Catherine Delahunty say the agreement makes no sense and that the party’s position in government amounts to a failure of leadership.

Delahunty criticised her former colleagues for not pointing to an “unholy alliance between banks and the government” that accounted for record bank profits, inflated house prices and growing inequality.

Former co-leader and current head of Greenpeace New Zealand Russel Norman has also called Green minister James Shaw’s climate position “simply not credible”.

RNZ can reveal a number of activists have recently stepped away from the party, including former executive and policy branch members.

They accuse co-leader Shaw of having an autocratic style and complain that the party executive is not holding the caucus and leadership to account over policy decisions in government.

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

The Greens’ co-leaders have rejected the criticisms, maintaining the party is democratic and making progressive changes in government.

The party signed the agreement on 31 October 2020.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told media the deal was about building consensus and stability, but emphasised her party had a right to govern alone in Parliament. Labour took more than 50 per cent of the vote.

Shaw remained Minister of Climate Change and Associate Minister for the Environment (Biodiversity), while fellow co-leader Marama Davidson became Minister for the Prevention of Family and Sexual Violence and Associate Minister of Housing (Homelessness).

The deal’s provisions bound the pair to ministerial collective responsibility but allowed the Greens to disagree and criticise the government on issues outside those ministries.

Shaw and Davidson were excluded from Cabinet and matters of fiscal policy.

Former policy branch and executive member Megan Brady-Clark – a delegate who voted to block the deal – said the specially-convened meeting over the agreement had been carefully managed.

Delegates gathered on Zoom in a virtual conference on 31 October, 2020 at 4pm, and were encouraged to come to ‘consensus’ around the document. They were given access to copies of the proposed agreement at 4.30pm, the same time it was being released publicly.

Brady-Clark said it had left little or no time for wider dissemination and debate within their branches.

A scheduled government media conference had also been planned the same evening to announce the agreement, exerting further pressure on delegates to agree to it.

 

It’s been 14 months since the Greens capitulated their mana for the vacant baubles of Office in a Government they have no power in and what have they to show for that strategic blunder?

Woke bullshit.

I warned the Greens in 2020 that unless they went in hard and demanded transformative change and threatened a civil war with Labour, they would get sweet FA, and they’ve managed to get even less than that!

Greta is right, the real power is protesting outside the conference, not selling out inside the conference!

The Green strategy team are chequers players trying to play chess.

Marama’s and James negotiating tactic was to get on their knees and beg!

You don’t get nuthin by begging, and they got nuthin…

GRANT: “Winston calm down, you don’t even have to look him in the eyes”
WINSTON: “And Marama, I can ignore her too right”.
JACINDA: “Guys, kindness please, James is right there, he can hear us talking about him”.
JAMES: “….”

…No policy gains, just a couple of vacant baubles of office.

The Greens repeatedly get screwed over by Labour in a never ending cycle of abuse that started with Helen Clark and you kind of feel like someone should step in and intervene now.

Labour gain the inoculation and political camouflage they want and the Greens get nuthin.

Jacinda’s tepid incrementalism will not be challenged by the Greens, it will be supported by them.

As the climate crisis events explode over the next 2 years, as welfare reform goes no where, as housing stagnates, as poverty spreads, the Greens will sit alongside Labour like a parasitic twin unable to think for itself let alone change things.

It is rapidly becoming apparent that Labour and the Greens are not the political vehicle for transformative change. With Labour too focused on preventing Covid from exploding in NZ and the Greens now gagged, no forward thinking vision on how to transform things will be articulated.

It’s a Labour + Green supported Government, that gives them 75 seats in a 120 seat Parliament  and yet they STILL CAN’T be transformative?

All the Greens have gained for their hollow Ministerships is collusion with mediocrity plus some identity politics wins.

The Greens don’t know if they are Arthur or Martha and if they did they would need a 7month hui to discuss pronoun use.

Watching Climate Strike For Students Auckland cancel itself last year because of heteronormative cis male privilege sums up the Greens perfectly. A middle class asthetic for social justice virtue signals tied into woke dogma that believes all white people are racist, all men are rapists and anyone supporting free speech is a Nazi.

The Greens are as alienating as a Spin-off dinner party where everyone is arguing over who hates white men the most.

The Greens are perfect for free the nipple rallies with cycling militant Trans ally mommy bloggers, not so good on the economic neoliberal hegemony.

They’ve spent a year harvesting the low hanging fruit of identity politics while doing nothing meaningful on poverty, homelessness or climate change.

Despite my contempt for what the Greens have mutated into I will still probably vote for them in 2023 but will jump the second there is a real alternative.

Their only hope is Chloe.

Chloe is a unique talent. She speaks with the energy of the new voting generation in a language that empowers and challenges. She is an incredible communicator and if she had the Leadership, she could dominate political debate.

What could be more radical than the youngest Political Leader in NZ History?

Chloe as Leader is a 15% Party. Imagine Jacinda as Prime Minister with Chloe as Deputy.

To be politically relevant, the Greens need to be needed by Labour. To do that they need to take Labour voters.

Chloe can do that. Marama and James can’t.

Meanwhile the planet burns.

Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.

If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media

78 COMMENTS

    • Agreed but even if Chloe did become co-leader the Greens would do a UK Labour on her like that pseudo Labour political party did to Corbyn.It takes more than one person. I would be happy to see the present Green Party fall apart and Labour voters have no where to run. Spineless bastards! A Plague Upon All Their Houses!

    • @Kyle…
      “Frankly”…? Who’s Frankly?
      Chloe Swarbrick is the answer no matter what you think our names are, in my humble opinion.
      Chloe Swarbrick is young, she’s intelligent and kind and she’s a whole human being. Not merely the arse hole of one.
      Wee Jimmy’s a corporate man. He’s a capitalist with a banking history so he’ll be sniffing around the sullied gumboots of our primary industry so by mere virtue of those elements he’ll be far further up the national party’s arse than anywhere else.
      Marama Davidson’s angry. I get the impression she’s an angry woman so she’ll be looking for any opportunity to rage and fume. Do we want an angry, raging, fuming person to ease our primary industry away from toxic agri-chemical ‘farming’ or do we want a person of reasonably stable emotions showing the way by leading using informed reason while inviting sober debate?
      Here’s my wish.
      That Swarbrick and Adern become a coalition government and after purging then retreading our institutionally crooked neoliberal/capitalist bureaucracy we unleash our [regenerative] agrarian primary industry onto a starving, burning world. ( City people? Worried yet? Well, don’t be. We can afford a universal living wage for you, especially after Swarbrick and Adern renationalise our taxes paid for assets and services the neoliberal’s stole off us. Having city people on a Basic Income is far cheaper than having city bound millionaires and billionaires buying real estate in NYC.
      Stuff.co.nz
      “$50m+ New York penthouse secured by NZ billionaire Graeme Hart”
      https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/homed/latest/113287433/50m-new-york-penthouse-secured-by-graeme-hart
      As a farmer I urge you to watch this…
      “Narrated and featuring Woody Harrelson, Kiss the Ground is an inspiring and groundbreaking film that reveals the first viable solution to our climate crisis.”
      https://kissthegroundmovie.com/
      Kiss The Ground.
      https://www.netflix.com/nz/title/81321999

      • Chloe Swarbrick is young, she’s intelligent and kind and she’s a whole human being

        lol, exactly the same thing was said about dear Jacinda dear a few years back. And here we have dear Jacinda with a full majority, a support party that is only known now for not knowing the biological difference between male / non male and, and our house prices are going up, our lending to first homebuyers is down evern more, kids hungry, kids dropping out of schools, health care sector such a fucking mess that all we can do is pray that Omicron don’t get out into the wild and long lines of people waiting for a food parcel from a charity cause they ain’t got enough money to buy food.

        Yeah, Chloe, is gonna be the super duper Saviour. Lol. LOl. Lol.

        • It seems like y’all are in agreement because you’re using similar words and emotional damage to refer to Jacinda and Chloe.

          But if you’re (Sabine) talking about “B” and we are talking about “A” well turn your just grinding your axe again. 🙂

          • you used to do better dude – todays offerings were really sub par.

            But yeah, with the ‘we are going to fix the housing crisis, we are going to fix childhood poverty St. Jacinda of fuck all , everyone in this country should have an axe to grind.
            The only reason she and her band of quota non male collecting stale male doodahs did not totally and utterly fuck up Covid was because they realized that Covid does not give a shit if it kills a poor person or a rich person and suddenly our very rich got very very scared. If covid – like homelessnesss and hunger – were to only afflict the poor and cast outs of society, St. Jacinda would give us one of her fake concern head tilt furrowed brow regards and then she would start : To those that have no home and no dinner I would say “Be kind”, and surely that will fix it.
            So you pray at the altar of St. Jacinda, and I personally hope that she is send to join Aunty Helen (another one ofthese Labour Ladies that achieved fuck all for the workers and poor of this country, but who did very well for herself, thanks voter) at the UN, were she can spend the rest of her life in a high up room with a view, a minion who will cook her some tea, a good wage and hopefully a job were she will no longer be able to fuck the lives up of ordinary people.

            2023 – Vote Labour, why? Well because they too fuck it up, but they fuck it up to he Lefts liking.

  1. “To be politically relevant, the Greens need to be needed by Labour. To do that they need to take Labour voters.”
    This is the crux of politics. The parties first, and those who exert the greatest influence over these parties, namely the moneyed crowd, next. The people, the voters, not a part of this fundamental equation. This is democracy, you’ve gotta love it….

  2. I must admit that I have been wondering what my position on the Green Party of which I am a member is going to be in the lead up to the next election. I’ve been put off by the Sexual Violence Bill which I see as being the left version of the three strikes law, plus the party’s position on hate speech, identity politics and so forth. My concern is that the extreme version of identity politics and woke philosophies is going to take over the party, alienating everyone else. To see where things might go, look to the United States where while the left is losing on nearly all fronts from working conditions to climate change, identity politics is becoming only more dominating.

    • It’s just the fucken holier than thou ad sickly sweet attitudes. Not to mention that they are led by their, “feelings.”

      I’ll day it again. The strong, do not take advice from The weak about how to be strong.

    • “My concern is that the extreme version of identity politics and woke philosophies is GOING TO take over the party …”?

      Wrong tense there EP.

    • E Pineapples. Agree 100%. The Green’s identity politics, and Marama’s appalling divisive hatefulness, finished me off with the only party to which I ever donated. I will never vote for them again.

      I cannot remember when I last voted Labour, but know that they are not concerned about New Zealanders, and they only pay lip service to giving our beautiful children the best start in life which they all deserve.

      Hence I echo Shona’s sentiments about what useless bastards they all are. I would add that they are also hypocrites. Add the smugness of the Greens, and there is only a sickly mess, in no way mitigated by letting pop stars in to entertain the hoi polloi, or the PM ‘reading a book’ during her summer vacation.

      • I have not voted for Labour since the mid eighties and cannot see myself voting for them ever again, I was an NLP member at the beginning then the Alliance then the Greens. But chucked my membership in when the Greens supported the waka jumping bill, this was never in their agreement with Labour and they simply should not have supported it ever. It was something, Rod, Jeanette, Sue x 2, Meteria, Keith, Nandor and others fought against. It is just plain wrong that you cannot remain in parliament when the party you are a part of leaves the principles it was voted in on. This is what Anderton did, the Labour party turned into the right wing establishment that it pretty much remains today.

        Chloe is not the answer by herself anyway.

        We really need to have at the next election an option in the voting papers for ‘no confidence’ this is the only thing that will really make a difference, there is no party that I would wish to vote for in parliament right now.

        There was a motion post the last election for the Green MPs who had some ministerial responsibility to pay a higher amount – to tithe – to the party. It was voted down by the Green MPs who had the fat salaries. I am not sure why anyone would ring up pensioners to get them to put $20 a week into the Green Party’s fund while this sort of nonsense is going on.

        The tithing that MPs in the Greens do should be way higher, that is if they believe in the ideals of equality and how we can make that a reality.

    • Hah, identity all the way. Have a read of this, seeing as we are importing all our political thinking from the US of A.
      Superfactions indeed. Team Red. Team Blue. Team Green. Team Yellow. The team of 5 million.

      https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jan/09/is-the-us-really-heading-for-a-second-civil-war

      One was the emergence of a government that is neither fully democratic nor fully autocratic – an “anocracy”. The other is a landscape devolving into identity politics where parties no longer organise around ideology or specific policies but along racial, ethnic or religious lines.

      Walter told the Observer: “By the 2020 elections, 90% of the Republican party was now white. On the taskforce, if we were to see that in another multiethnic, multi-religious country which is based on a two-party system, this is what we would call a super faction, and a super faction is particularly dangerous.”

  3. Apart from being part of the 1%, what has the Greens MPs done?

    Do not vote for them, and see what happens to them (the MPs), my guess is nothing…they, the MPs, do not have much going on.

    • I dunno, James burnt a few tonne of carbon and prevented plenty of other kiwis to return home by taking up MIQ positions to take himself and a few select buddies to Glasgow so he could talk for 15mins to an empty auditorium…that’s winning in Green Speak.

  4. So, who do we need to talk to about starting a petition to have Chloe installed as leader? It strikes me that, on the surface at least, the structure within the ruling clique in the party has become far too similar to the reactionary conservative model that the nats have used since before they called themselves the national party, and the labour party has adopted increasingly over the decades since their inception…
    It’s time for the rank and file to pick up their pitchforks, and burning torches, and storm the battlements of head office…

    • Where’s Head Office these days @ Stefan?
      I hope it’s not Garret Street. Don’t they have plans on converting it to an Orange Cone area before too long in order to fulfil one of Tamantha’s wet dreams? Mind you, it should be bloody gorgeous if and when it’s finished.
      Sure as shit I won’t be going near the place to pick up Green Party campaign leaflets for delivery even while I’ve been a Labour suppota.

  5. Luxon and Seymour will be quietly smiling. The Greens down the tubes and Labour without a coalition party means Labour is down the tubes too.

  6. All woke talk, no action.

    Hard to believe co-leader Marama Davidson is the Minister for Homelessness. There’s a cause worth holding useless Labours feet to the fire for, but so far, nothing but pure capitulation. Sadly an abject failure, in fact one that uses Nationals motels model as a rug to sweep the victims of our train wreck of a housing market under.

    Actually it’s hard to believe there is such a ministry.

    And I doubt Chloe could give Jacinda the bravery needed, practically Wizard of Oz fantasy stuff like trying to give the Lion courage. Jacinda is just plain ol’ risk adverse when it comes to day to day policy and always will be.

  7. Chloe as co-leader sounds really good on paper, she’s young popular, the only mp who talks about social democratic economic reforms.

    However, she’s also got extreme baggage that hasn’t had any scrutiny because she’s not in a position of power. The media will crucify her for her positions on police/prisons (proudly wants to abolish both and regularly wears papa merch) , her associations and top campaign reps are people who highjacked pride and screamed abuse at gay/lesbian people and gay rights activists, the organization she promotes papa has said things like child molesters should have to do group therapy with their victims.

    She’s woker than the lot of them. She’s already incredibly divisive amongst the left who see her as a rich Eliza Thornberry type and the media and right would constantly cover her privileged upbringing and the woke would drop in a heart beat.

    She’s more likely to send people to labour rather than away and you can bet based off her twitter she’ll pull a Turei and do some extremely controversial statement on the fly with no media game plan to manage any fall out other than saying “maaate” more times than they drink driving ad.

    The marijuana referendum is her failure to own also, labour may be cowards but it was her job. Instead of talking about economic wins and civil liberties she constantly talked about race which offended brown people because they felt she was calling them all drug users. She’s never taken responsibility for this failure or for writing quite frankly a pretty shitty reform bill.

    Her ideas about police and prisons reek of a privileged rich kid from a nice neighborhood who doesn’t understand that people in poor people may want police reform but it’ll be our neighborhoods that’ll be on fire without police or prisons.

    The greens are annoying but they are the Greens, they aren’t built for a huge economic reform agenda on the left it’s not in their dna they are a middle to upper middle class environmentalist party on the center left like all other green partys globally, anti neoliberal but that’s about it.

    It’s not fair to expect them to be something they are not, there’s a reason all proportional systems have a center left party, a green party and a left wing party and to try to highjack the greens instead of creating and maintaining a left wing party is lazy. That’s on all of us.

    The NZ left is lazy. There hasn’t been a real attempt at a left wing party since the alliance fell, the closest we came to it was spending a few months trying to use a Maori rights partys seat to get a party backed by a millionaire into parliament and then abandoned ship immediately after that election. We need to organize and to spend several parliamentary terms creating, promoting a new movement with no baggage from old activists and former mps who highjack any new left movement. The NZ left unfortunately doesn’t have the energy or patience to do this so instead we’re angry that a middle class party is being a middle class party and hyping up an ultra woke upper middle class mp to lead us to the promised land just to be disappointed when that hyper woke upper middle class mp leads like a hyper woke middle class leader.

    A true labour/green coalition will be no different than the current govt, the only option is a party so frightening to labour that it’d sit in the cross benches and vote on an issue by issue basis with a labour/green minority govt and threaten them at all times with a vote of no confidence if they don’t get what they want on economic reforms instead of taking woke policy wins and utter crumbs on economic policies.

    I’m not bashing internet mana btw it was a decent idea but when people say there has been “so many attempts at creating a left wing party” I can only think of one in the last twenty years. We need our own party, and to understand it’ll be a long time before it gets into parliament.

    • Swarbrick has always seemed to me to be a liberal centrist, while also hopping on the trends being followed by people around her.

    • “… the Greens, they aren’t built for a huge economic reform agenda on the left it’s not in their dna they are a middle to upper middle class environmentalist party”

      I think that’s a clear-eyed view, Corey Humm. Genuine economic reform – of the sort that would bring long-term benefits to the poor – has never been in the Greens’ middle-class political DNA.

    • “to try to highjack the greens instead of creating and maintaining a left wing party is lazy. That’s on all of us.”

      Yes, the core of our problem.

      We have no substantial left wing party in NZ. Haven’t had one since New Labour and the broader (or, if you prefer, diluted) Alliance.

      For decades I feel that I’ve had nobody to vote for.

    • Spot on Corey.
      She like the rest of the Greens are so devoid of economic intelligence, most voters will simply never cross that fence.

  8. Yet one had to admire Julie Anne Genter for riding her bike, whilst in labour to a birthing unit. It does not bear thinking what would have happened to her and her yet to be born baby if she crashed but the virtue signalling to the godforsaken bicycle lobby was simply too much to turn down!

    • How long before her bubba comes of age?. Will it be 16 or 18 years. And when he or she or it does, it’ll all be too late – but then I guess he/she/it might still be able to piss on a few graves.
      A few years ago, I always thought JAG would have been a better candidate than Marama, but when I said so on that site that’s run by the World’s best IT person, some silly bitch (who I suspect is a Southern Cross pub going neo-feminist) piled on the shit.
      Things have moved on from there of course, but let’s hope the Greens get their shit together PDQ. There is talent in there (such as Cloe, Ricardo and others)
      JUST as there is in Labour (admittedly in short supply – IF ONLY JA, and Chippie for that matter, could get their bullshit detectors to work properly when they’re aimed several colleagues and even more senior State servants)
      Not going to happen in a hurry though is it?

  9. I have voted with my feet over their piss poor performance as a coalition partner. When asked for membership payment last year I sent them a message about how they have lost their way and have consequently lost my support. What was their response? A “nice” list of their so-called achievements and a bit of blah blah about how they hope I will continue to support them. The outcome? I’m still getting all the Party com as if I’m still a member!
    I would like nothing more than for them to get their act(sic) together but I get the feeling the wrong people are running the bureaucracy.

    • Garibaldi. You were lucky. I once emailed Shaw with a specific objective question, I think about their waka jumping shiftiness, and I received only a generic reply. After I stopped donating, I continued to get their money-begging and emails from three Green sources. I’m pleased that I never accepted their invites for a beer down at the Southern Cross, I don’t fit.

      Nevertheless I look forward to Marama Davidson solving the problems of sexual and family violence in New Zealand – oops – in Aotearoa – as I watch the pigs flying past my open windows.

  10. They ruled out working with National so Labour can use and abuse as they like . If they had wanted real power at the table they could hAve gone with National who would have accepted an conditions to stay in power. They did not have the balls then o will always be the bridesmaid never the bride . It is a pity because they do have some valid points to bring to the table .

    • I somewhat agree. Even the threat of potentially choosing National would give the Greens more impetus in negotiations with Labour. But at the end of the day James and Marama need to get a bit tougher and be prepared to walk away from supporting this current iteration of Labour. Would I give Chloe a go? Yes, but definitely not in the next four years. To think she will somehow make Ardern transformational is unrealistic and I would hate to see Chloe tainted with Arderns epic failures in the areas Martyn has noted. Chloe should take over the reigns after the 2023 election in my opinion and she should take over alone, drop the co-leader nonsense.

  11. “Their only hope is Chloe.”

    You rail against the Greens’ infatuation with woke identity politics, and then go on to insist (again) that Chloe is the answer? So Martyn, you haven’t noticed that Chloe Darling is just a teeeeny bit woke herself?

    Ah, the blindness of love.

  12. I agree with Sue Bradford that The GP is very poor on realpolitik and strategically, and that it is all about power. I also agree strongly with Catherine Delahunty that the GP lacks an understanding and approach to dealing with structural economic power – they pick at isolated symptoms rather than confronting the underlying problems. This to me seems to be a major failing of Green parties internationally in terms of their underlying principles. The NZGP only deals with those structural issues and realpolitik when people with power and status in the party foreground it.

    It is why I am desperately looking for alternative parties and/or representatives.

    Also, for all the NZGPs talk about ‘gender’ and sexual issues, they do not understand that biological sex (not subjective identifications with ‘gender’), is a structural, systemic issue – males and females are sex-classes, set at conception that cannot be changed. As Engels said, women were the first exploited class. Economic class is not the only significant class that is crucial in a democratic society.

    However, currently economic inequalities and exploitation are a MAJOR problem in NZ and internationally and NZ lacks a politically party that can really get to grips with changing it.

  13. The Greens are a classic example of student level politics. Sure, it’s good enough to get reelected with a handful of list MPs voted in by the fringe, but nowhere near serious enough to develop environmental policies that actually work or could be supported by mature voters. Scientists and engineers are the people who are in the best position to write these policies but they long ago abandoned that party because of its narcissistic immaturity.

    The Greens have made several missteps thanks to their technological ineptitude. They were anti GMO, nuclear power and natural gas. All of these now represent a more sustainable future:

    https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/eu-plans-to-classify-nuclear-and-natural-gas-as-green-energy

    https://www.bio.org/blogs/gmos-have-benefits-environment

    • Agree student level politics.
      Scientists and Engineers along with business leaders are needed to find solutions to the issues.

      • “…along with business leaders are needed to find solutions to the issues.” Who the hell do think has been running the country into the ground since 1985?

        I can agree with a call for the scientists and engineers as neither have had a look-in since the seventies.

        • The scientists and engineers need the cooperation of business leaders to bring about outcomes.Alone they won’t be heard.

  14. Ben Waimata January 9, 2022 at 6:43 pm
    I would suggest the current version of the = apt comment/observation.

  15. The greens need to decide are they an environmentalist party, are they a hipster social justice pressure group or last and most likely are they just another urban middle class circle jerk….we need to know.

    • At the moment @gagarin, I think you probably know the answer to your question.
      Although with your second option (the hipster social justice pressure group), you could probably tie the stereotype down a little more precisely – and it’d involve some of the people I have the misfortune to have to live next door to. Thanfully mumsy and dadsie arrived over the break to come rescue them, although they did leave behind a load of toxic rubbish and other shite they often lecture others about

  16. Bring back Sue Kegley and the oldie Greens that championed what was important to the majority of people voting Green.

    “Supermarkets are pricing fresh fruit and vegetables up to 500 percent higher than the cost of production, according to a Green Party survey.

    The party’s food spokeswoman, Sue Kedgley, said it was also alarming that supermarkets were ripping off consumers on essential foods.

    The Greens have renewed calls for tighter rules to break the duopoly of New Zealand’s supermarket giants, Progressive Enterprises and Foodstuffs, which together control 95 percent of the grocery retail sector.

    And apart from the effect on consumers, many growers who supply the supermarkets say they are not breaking even.

    Leon Stallard, president of the Hawke’s Bay Fruitgrowers Association, said he was getting the same for his apples as he was paid 12 years ago – 50 cents a kilo – when the same apples were on supermarket shelves priced at $4 a kilo.

    “It takes us 365 days to grow the fruit. We harvest it, we take all the risk, and if it doesn’t meet their specifications they throw it out and don’t pay us,” he said.”

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/3882634/Supermarkets-food-pricing-attacked

  17. But Martin, what does Chloe truly stand for? Buggered if I can work it out – maybe ‘dope for all’ for the middle class dope heads who don’t want to be stigmatised as druggies, but that seems to be it.

    She stands for nothing except woke virtue signalling, and has really achieved nothing.

  18. The Greens are useless. They always have been. There hasn’t been a decent left since the Alliance wound up. If they were still around I would vote for them.

    I’m thinking of staying home at the next election. I don’t want to vote for any of them.

  19. I find Ricardo Menéndez March more nauseating than any other politician from any party.

    He introduces himself to NZ at Parliament by stating what an affront it is to him having to acknowledge the Queen. Excuse me? You are already out of step with the bulk of Kiwis. If it’s that big of an affront to you then bye bye. Back to Mexico. I would never dream of insulting the constitution of your country of origin.

    Never once have I heard him speaking positively about hard working Kiwi’s. More money for the unemployed and more immigrants is his go regardless.

    When he returns to NZ he abuses his position to gain priority entry into NZ by stating he is a very important person to NZ. Yea right.

    The man is an entitled knob jockey.

    In years gone by I respected the Green Party. Now I see them as a chocolate fireguard.

    Chloe is worth twice as much as all the others put together.

    • Thinking-Man. Agree about Ricardo. But you too will grow old and Ricardo, the young guy from Mexico, will be your Green representative just as he is mine. What’s he doing here anyway, and what’s his problem with New Zealand’s head of state ? He shouldn’t have gone into our Parliament if he rejects our constitutional framework.

      Are you sure it’s not just a cisgender female problem? The Greens are hellishly complicated that way, plus the Queen is a white woman, and the Green co-leader isn’t too keen on the colour white.

      Dreadful poverty in Mexico, horrendous slums among their glorious colours and music and vitality. I wonder why he’s not helping them there.

    • I’m an ex-Mercian(northern) working class, social democrat and I find the german backpacker lizzy the 2 offensive….

      but your right about ricardo all he proves is pompous entitled fuckwittery is international, I came to NZ out of love(NZ partner) and hope that NZ would be better than the shitheap the UK had become…not to run down or change NZ, well not until I’d got my knees brown anyway.

      • gagarin,

        I enjoy your colourful input.

        I’ve met some champion Mexican folk along the way. He’s not one of them. As Snow White rightly points out, there are many serious social issues in Mexico in need of attention but the entitled eggplant comes to NZ and rubbishes / disrespects our system while achieving SFA apart from setting himself up nicely.

    • Thinking-Man – I’ll amend my previous comment to clarify that I don’t think Ricardo is the worst, that’s probably Marama. Ricardo is an outsider, but Davidson is meant to be one of us. In line perhaps with Chris Trotter’s current Green comment, Davidson doesn’t know her history, and I think she cherry-picks, and she judges based on faulty knowledge and a paucity of reference points. This is offensive to we whose whakapapa includes the hard workers whom you reference, and the community builders, and I consider her by no means typical of educated Maori.

      • I agree with your perspective SW. Davidson is typical of a person who likely goes into politics for the right reasons but then gets lost in the process and ends up achieving absolutely zero apart from feathering her own nest. Her occasional contentious comments appear to be the work of a person wanting to remind others she’s still around …..and then she just goes back to enjoying all the perks and trimmings of being an MP. Her political legacy will be a blank page.

  20. OMFG how many on this thread have ever actually stood for office? How many of you have any idea what it is like to be accountable and exposed to the extent our politicians are (and isnt is great we have an open democracy?) How many of you have a fekking clue about how our parliamentary system works and the sheer effort being an MP takes? How many of you would read this and go well I would rather sit on my arse and criticise. Because that’s what you do.

    • Take a breath, Fenton. There’s much you don’t know about how little people with little support and few resources can and do fight for the well being of others without any thought of self, or of recompense, so don’t try to silence anybody, thanks all the same.

    • Darien F. I’m wondering how many politicians are as aggressive towards the voting public as you seem to be, and why. Your language isn’t the best either. Judge not – you’re not one of the Green girls.

    • Darien.Fenton,

      OMFG,

      Keith Quinn was a highly respected rugby commentator who watched and commentated / commented on thousands of games especially All Black matches.

      How many games did Keith play as an All Black?

      Has TVNZ Political editor Jessica Mutch McKay ever stood for office?

      etc etc etc etc

Comments are closed.