Written By: - Date published: 5:35 pm, May 21st, 2011 - 84 comments
Despite some progress under the last Labour government, too many children have been allowed to slip through the gaps in this country. And now of course, under a National government, it’s getting worse. In her conference speech this evening Annette King renewed her promise that the next Labour government will put children at the centre of policy.
Written By: - Date published: 1:08 pm, May 18th, 2011 - 89 comments
Labour have been running a competition to crowd source their billboard design. Here is the winner, which (see Red Alert) will be going up around Wellington shortly. It’s going to provoke some controversy.
Written By: - Date published: 2:26 pm, May 17th, 2011 - 40 comments
Good speech here from David Cunliffe to the Manufacturers and Exporters Association last night. He and David Parker both spoke and I understand their message was very well received by the audience. He outlines the principles for a good budget, and then answers the question about what would Labour do. There is another one to Business New Zealand today.
Written By: - Date published: 8:30 pm, May 12th, 2011 - 40 comments
Watch Jacinda Ardern clean up Jamie-Lee Ross on Breakfast this morning. Nearly half of the National Government’s much-quoted borrowing of $300 million a week is to pay for their tax cuts. That was this government’s choice. Now their choice is that everyone else has to pay for it.
Written By: - Date published: 2:49 pm, May 12th, 2011 - 68 comments
We have a date for what promises to be a fascinating by election. The pressure is on Hone Harawira…
Written By: - Date published: 10:36 am, May 11th, 2011 - 38 comments
Labour has decided to stand Kelvin Davis in the Te Tai Tokerau by-election. I wish they hadn’t. First, Davis strikes me as quality and you don’t tarnish quality by making it lose in front of a national audience. Look what happened to Melissa Lee, former National rising star. And Davis will lose, let’s be honest.
Written By: - Date published: 7:52 pm, May 10th, 2011 - 19 comments
It was good to hear Mike Williams as the voice of the left on Nine to Noon yesterday. It is high time that someone from the broad left had the mike, to coin a phrase. Mike “spat on the altar” and had a friendly go at his mate Matt McCarten’s strategy for a by-election in Te Tai Tokerau, a kind of joust of the gurus. He thinks Matt made a mistake there, and I agree.
Written By: - Date published: 8:42 am, May 7th, 2011 - 33 comments
The semi-hysterical responses of some of the unreconstructed left and pseudo-left about some at the Standard supporting Hone Harawira and the Mana Party has really been quite revealing. They seem to think, with a clarity of logic Garth George would surely envy, that refusal to endorse a public burning of Harawira constitutes some kind of crazily misplaced […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:20 am, May 5th, 2011 - 9 comments
Here’s an interesting Wikileaks cable on the ‘objectivity’ of the New Zealand msm, particularly the Herald. The cable relates to the period leading up to the last election. Most of it seems like a pretty fair appraisal to me, despite it perhaps being a little optimistic about the influences ideology and profit motive have on […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:55 am, May 2nd, 2011 - 156 comments
Phil Goff has gone one step further today and ruled out working with anyone that signs up to The Mana Party, not just the already ruled-out Hone Harawira. A Labour Party spokeswoman is reported by the Herald as saying “He doesn’t prescribe to the values of Hone Harawira.”
Would Phil Goff care to explain which of Harawira’s values he doesn’t ‘prescribe’ [sic] to?
Written By: - Date published: 10:27 am, April 24th, 2011 - 79 comments
Tweedledum and Tweedledee were a bit slow off the mark responding to the news that Don Brash is looking to take over ACT. Took the Nats a while to get their lines together but have decided, on balance, they want ACT dead. And that will be a lot easier to achieve if Brash isn’t in charge.
Written By: - Date published: 8:29 pm, April 21st, 2011 - 54 comments
I’ve long held to the principle of owning your mistakes and as such I’ve gotta say I was wrong about one aspect of the “stop asset sales” campaign – the signs are authorised.
Written By: - Date published: 1:33 pm, April 21st, 2011 - 47 comments
I heard David Cunliffe on Morning Report on Tuesday, and he was superb. But as soon as he finished I knew the Right would try to deflect from the substance by writing it off as leadership ambitions. And sure enough we have Audrey Young, making exactly that connection. Labour can turn that on its head.
Written By: - Date published: 12:20 am, April 21st, 2011 - 110 comments
Labour’s stop asset sales campaign should have been good but it wasn’t.
Not because of its legal cock-ups (okay not just because of its legal cock-ups) but because it was rolled out in a vacuum.
Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, April 19th, 2011 - 67 comments
Former senior Labour party strategist John Pagani has written an extraordinary blog post where he says Labour ought to cuddle up to National because its policies are so popular and then, somehow, convince people to vote Labour for some reason. If this has been Labour’s strategy for the past few years, it explains a lot.
Written By: - Date published: 6:16 pm, April 18th, 2011 - 59 comments
This weekend just gone there was a conference in Wellington for Labour candidates to get us all up to speed with the campaign. We’re ready to go out there and make it happen.
Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, April 18th, 2011 - 58 comments
The TV3 poll has the NACT vs Lab/Green/NZF gap at 22% vs 9% in the latest Roy Morgan. I’ll tend to pay attention to the company that polls every fortnight to the one that polls once in a blue moon. Nevertheless, the story of both polls is the same: Labour struggling to make headway + Nats potentially with a majority = opportunity for Winston Peters
Written By: - Date published: 10:39 am, April 17th, 2011 - 36 comments
Ratana elders are unhappy with Labour over its list rankings, and have called on supporters to abandon the Party. Phil Goff needs to work on the relationship with the Church immediately. For Labour the only silver lining in this cloud, and the focus on its list in general, is the fact that it illustrates what a large and diverse group of people the Party has to represent.
Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, April 16th, 2011 - 68 comments
Every country that has ever sleepwalked from democracy to dictatorship has done it in the belief that it was taking extraordinary, temporary measures in response to an emergency. Seeing Labour denounce every aspect of CERA and then vote for it has shaken me to the core.
Written By: - Date published: 9:32 pm, April 8th, 2011 - 50 comments
The latest Roy Morgan poll shows little impact from the Darren Hughes affair to date. We still don’t know how the investigation will play out but the poll suggests dithering leadership matters less than economic fundamentals. The big news, though, is that New Zealand First would be back under these numbers.
Written By: - Date published: 12:00 pm, April 8th, 2011 - 68 comments
Labour’s candidate for Wairarapa, Michael Bott, on this out of touch government: “John Key smiles and waves for the cameras in Christchurch then jumps on a plane to Cape Kidnappers to spend the equivalent of a pensioner’s yearly income on one-off novelty dining with his wife – you can’t get more different than that.”
Written By: - Date published: 10:14 am, April 3rd, 2011 - 66 comments
Judith Tizard won’t take Labour’s vacant seat in Parliament. It’s the right thing to do. It’s only a quirk that we should be looking back to a list written in 2008 to fill a seat for 6 months now. Tizard and the next four on the 2008 list aren’t on the 2011 list. Their lives have moved on. Better for the seat to go to someone with a Parliamentary future – Louisa Wall.
Written By: - Date published: 3:23 pm, March 29th, 2011 - 52 comments
Vernon Small says “Its activists on websites and blogs are openly questioning the party’s direction and Mr Goff’s judgment.” He seems to be looking at our non-Labour activists of the left and the astroturfers and seeing a movement against Goff.
Mostly it isn’t from Labour activists. It isn’t real. It is just designed for him and other journos to read.
Written By: - Date published: 1:21 pm, March 29th, 2011 - 171 comments
The Labour Party front bench meeting in Dunedin has just concluded. Goff’s leadership has been confirmed, with unanimous support.
Written By: - Date published: 10:39 pm, March 26th, 2011 - 64 comments
The latest media frenzy about a Phil Goff coup is rapidly dying down. The Government passed some controversial legislation in double-quick time with little coverage and somebody made a killing on iPredict. Coincidence?
Written By: - Date published: 6:45 am, March 26th, 2011 - 257 comments
It’s been a dreadful week for Labour. So out come the oft repeated rumours of a coup against leader Phil Goff. Usually this is just the ever predictable right wing blogs stirring. This time the excellent Scoop news site is making the claim. Scoop has it wrong.
Written By: - Date published: 5:50 pm, March 25th, 2011 - 204 comments
Darren Hughes has resigned as an MP.
Written By: - Date published: 8:02 pm, March 24th, 2011 - 114 comments
Darren Hughes has been suspended from his shadow portfolios due to the continuing police investigation. Goff probably should have done this earlier, despite the understandable wariness of a leader can’t punish an MP on the strength of a complaint alone. As Key did with Wong and Worth, Goff has waited until the media issue became too big.
Written By: - Date published: 12:56 pm, March 23rd, 2011 - 2 comments
Darren Hughes has identified himself as under investigation by the Police. No details on the issue. Hughes says he did nothing wrong. Clearly not what was needed with Labour hammering National on the economy. Comments off on this post and strict moderation elsewhere for legal reasons.
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