Election Night 2017: The numbers tend to change in the final count. Here’s what we reckon are the thresholds for survival in advanced votes. We’ve been banging on about advance votes and the enrol’n’vote combo offer and special votes for a bit now, but as we await the great democratic sky with our arms outstretched, … Read more
The 36 Questions Project is a series in which Meg Williams takes a politician on a date and asks them the 36 Questions, a series of conversation starters designed to make two people fall in love. In this final instalment, Williams dates Green Party candidate Chlöe Swarbrick. Previously on the 36 Questions Project: United Future … Read more
Frustration within the Greens over perceived disregard for their Memorandum of Understanding partner is increasingly coming to the surface. Will it aid or enfeeble the smaller party, wonders Toby Manhire. At the Back Benches debate in Auckland last month, a Green Party supporter held aloft a sign that declared, on a green background “Campaigning against … Read more
What would you do if your political allies were about to form a government but your party was in danger of not being part of it? Simon Wilson goes to Sunday’s Green rally, where the sole remaining co-leader launched the battle that will determine the party’s future, and may also define the shape of the … Read more
Early voting for New Zealanders living overseas opens today. Rebekah Holt talks to some expat voters to discover whether the Jacinda effect has taken hold in Australia. In early July this year the then co-leader of the New Zealand Green Party James Shaw visited Melbourne to recruit NZ voters living here, and visit his dad. … Read more
In our video series Kiwis of Snapchat, comedian Tom Sainsbury sources exclusive Snapchat footage of Kiwi citizens and luminaries making the news. Today: Green Party hopeful Robin McCandless heads out to meet the voters. Click here for all our Kiwis of Snapchat videos.
TV3 has a new poll out tonight. Simon Wilson unpicks what it will mean for the different parties if that poll reinforces the trend to Labour revealed in TVNZ’s poll three days ago. Warning: this story contains some outrageously unprovable assumptions. Here’s an interesting proposition about the election outcome, based largely on one big assumption: … Read more
Jacinda Ardern met a cute dog today and also faced up to questions about the environment. She did not say what some people might expect. The Green Party announced a plan today to help some farmers move out of dairying and assist others to operate more sustainably. The Greens’ plan would be funded by a … Read more
Right now the polls suggest Labour and National are sharing about 80% of the vote. If they draw level at 40% each, who will get into parliament and who will get thrown out? And what about the Greens? We’re not saying they’re going to get 40% each. But that does seem to be the number … Read more
It was a dank but not very stormy night. The school hall was filled with people, and home baking. And some politicians. Simon Wilson was also there. There are things you can say in Titirangi that you wouldn’t dream of in some other parts of the city. Deborah Russell, Labour candidate for New Lynn, which … Read more
Pollwatch: 1 News’s Colmar Brunton survey puts the Greens out of parliament, in a nostalgic National vs Labour race. MMP was meant to make multi-party politics the norm, and so it has: we’ve never seen a majority one-party government. But the two big parties have resisted all obituaries, and the new Colmar Brunton poll for … Read more
What will National do if the wheels start to come off its campaign? How will Jacindamania cope with Labour policies that are not progressive? And what about those head-to-head leader debates? Simon Wilson looks at potential turmoil to come. 1. Jacinda Ardern will have to explain Labour’s immigration policy Did everyone forget Labour’s record on immigration? … Read more
In our video series Kiwis of Snapchat, comedian Tom Sainsbury sources exclusive Snapchat footage of Kiwi citizens making the news. Today: Green Party leader James Shaw is hopping mad about losing co-leader Metiria Turei. Click here for all our Kiwis of Snapchat videos. This content is entirely funded by Simplicity, New Zealand’s only nonprofit fund … Read more
The transgressions of Metiria Turei are similar to the transgressions of Bill English and John Key. Or are they? The Herald has fact checked; now Simon Wilson has sense-checked the facts. As we know, Metiria Turei lied to Work and Income about her flatmates to prevent her benefit being cut, because, she says, she needed … Read more
Stop the election bus for just one second, please. Toby Manhire, Annabelle Lee and Ben Thomas have recorded a new Gone By Lunchtime podcast and it will probably be overtaken by events by teatime. Two third-term Green MPs have in effect jumped ship, saying Metiria Turei is not fit to lead the party. Will that torpedo … Read more
An attempted mutiny against Metiria Turei has ended with two MPs resigning and the Greens thrown into turmoil. The Ardern euphoria now faces a brutal hangover, writes Toby Manhire #IstandwithMetiria, went one of the rallying cries that echoed among Green supporters in response to the backlash against the co-leader’s revelations of historic law-breaking. This evening two … Read more
In the third of our series mining the truths from the political promos, Toby Manhire overthinks ‘Great Greens’. Already the Spinoff has turned its groundbreaking and vandalistic attention to the National Party’s “Let’s Get Together” and the Labour Party’s “Fresh Start”. Today it’s the turn of the Greens, whose first campaign ad was well ahead of … Read more
The Greens had their annual conference this weekend: the perfect opportunity to provide the bold leadership and arresting policy they’ve been missing. Simon Wilson was there to find out if they took it. It’s about leadership. Political parties can have the best policies in the world but if we don’t believe their leaders are trustworthy, likeable … Read more
Fear not, Labour and the Greens: everything is possible. And here in one simple post, Simon Wilson sets it out: why life’s got so hard for them, who their enemies really are and what they can do to win. The first thing to say about elections is that sudden changes of mood are possible. Single events … Read more
If they want to move the dial and mobilise young people, Labour and the Greens could jettison the budget rules they signed up to, writes former National Party cabinet minister Wayne Mapp, in the first of his new series of columns for The Spinoff. The election is now just over two months way. It comes … Read more
We conclude our week-long series on the new memoir by former Green MP Holly Walker with a review by another ex-MP – Deborah Coddington. Who would have thought Holly Walker, mother and Green MP from 2011 to 2014, was a victim of violent abuse while she was in Parliament? Her face was so badly bruised … Read more
In a little over three months, New Zealand goes to the polls. Recent months have seen shock and volatility in elections around the world. Will we see something similar? Here we assess the contenders’ status as the clock counts down to September 23. A big day for lovers of democracy and arbitrary round numbers: there are one hundred sunsets … Read more
All this week the Spinoff Review of Books is covering the new, very candid memoir by former Green MP Holly Walker, and the mental health issues she experienced in parliament. Today: an interview conducted by Green candidate Chlöe Swarbrick. Read an excerpt from Walker’s book, The Whole Intimate Mess, here. Chlöe Swarbrick: What was it like … Read more
All this week the Spinoff Review of Books is devoted to a candid, sometimes shocking new memoir by ex-Green MP Holly Walker about her experience as a working mother in parliament. Today: an excerpt. One Friday morning, about three months after my return to work, I held a drop-in clinic for constituents in Petone. Parliament … Read more
Yesterday the Green Party announced a major policy platform aimed at parents and children in New Zealand. In her own words, Green Party co-leader Metiria Turei explains the Budget for All Mothers. All Kiwi kids deserve the best great start in life, right? And what better country to raise kids: we are blessed with a … Read more
In her second candidate diary for the Spinoff, the Greens’ Chlöe Swarbrick recounts a moving visit to Christchurch and pays tribute to partner of five years Alex, a rock in a turbulent political tide. Christchurch is very flat. That makes it an incredible city to cycle or walk around. It also means that when you’re standing … Read more
In her first candidate diary for the Spinoff, Chlöe Swarbrick recounts a mad few weeks, getting 13th on the Greens’ initial list, and the thorny question of what our country stands for. Read candidate diaries for the Spinoff by Erica Stanford (National, East Coast Bays) and Kiri Allan (East Coast) here. In 2017, what does Aotearoa New … Read more
Instead of backing US bombs in Syria and feeding perpetual war, we should be applying our energy to the underlying issues, writes the Iran-born human rights lawyer and Green candidate Golriz Ghahraman. I lived under American (and American sponsored) missiles for the first eight years of my life. Every day since Donald Trump was elected president I’ve … Read more
The ‘initial’ Greens list for the election is a bit light on Auckland, strong on women and insufficiently regenerative, argues Simon Wilson. Update, May 30: The Greens have published their final list; these are the top 20, with any change from initial list. 1 Metiria Turei 2 James Shaw 3 Marama Davidson +1 4 Julie … Read more