Hard News: Metiria's Problem
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Back when I was a university student, I seem to recall that the hostel students could vote for their "home" electorate even though they were living in Wellington.
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Dennis Frank, in reply to
Yes, I saw that on Pundit. I have asked him for clarification because, to my untutored reading of the relevant section ("A person resides at the place where that person chooses to make his or her home by reason of family or personal relations, or for other domestic or personal reasons") it seems to me that there is profound ambiguity in this clause. It seems to read as saying that one can call a place The-place-of-one's-residence if one chooses to regard it as one's home for "personal reasons". In other words, `home is where the heart is' and not where one actually resides in the ordinary sense of the word. And if Turei's heart was in the last place she lived where her friend was standing for election, then surely she perfectly free to choose to call that her home, and therefore her residence for electoral purposes.
I'm seeking clarification too, Henry. The evolution of the Pundit thread has made Metiria's declaration seem as valid as John Key's re Helensville. If so, then the accusation that she committed electoral fraud ought to be directed at Key on the same basis. If this is all a straw man being waved by Paddy Gower, he ought to apologise to his viewers for screwing up. Doesn't mean the rest of media can avoid responsibility for recycling his accusation without doing their legal homework to discover he's wrong.
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Is it perhaps worth noting again that the NZ benefit levels are set 20% below minimum survival costs, that no one who is on a benefit doesn't cheat the system somehow in order to survive, because it's impossible by design to survive on a benefit.
It's been like this for twenty years now. Obviously we're going to have younger people who've been on benefits at some point who cheated a bit on their benefit applications. Once the rent subsidies came in and all the rents went up to capture them, obviously everyone on a benefit had to cheat those too, or go live in a fucking car or something.
But I guess freedom camping's just a lifestyle choice, right.
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Toby Morris's most excellent Greed Vs. Need
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James Littlewood*, in reply to
Bravo!
While it’s true that Metiria’s roll of the dice might not have turned up quite what she was hoping for, I don’t think it’s a bad outcome at all. I think both the Greens and Labour have demonstrated an ability to move fast and decisively and they’ve dominated the headlines now for the thick end of a month while National wallows in Colemanitis.
I think it’s good that bigger Labour is now clearly positioned to the right of smaller Greens. I think that will work to the strategic advantage of both: Labour’s there for disaffected MOR National 2014 voters, and Greens are there for both disaffected Labour voters and those on the hard left.
So even if there’s a push-me-pull-you between the Labour and the Green share of the party vote, there’s a coherency to the #ChangeTheGovt movement which was sorely lacking 2014.
Link includes a plug for Craig’s useful list.
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Dennis Frank, in reply to
Your reference to the list - "a handy list of transgressions of currently sitting government ministers" - requires an amendment. Only one of the eight names on the list fits that description.
I'll be voting Green for the 10th election in a row but disapprove your allocation of the Greens to the far left. At a stretch, it may seem to apply to the parliamentarians. It doesn't apply to the party as a whole, nor to the broader green movement. The authentic Green political position has always been neither left nor right.
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andin, in reply to
emotional intelligence.
That spectacularly misfiring brain function? Say hi to it, next time you meet.
Explain to us how intellect plays a really important part in their decision. Or maybe you can’t?
I cant speak for the rest of humanity But thinking about stuff and recognizing faulty reasoning or one's own or others prejudices seems to work
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Craig Young, in reply to
I live to serve! ;) Can anyone calculate the sums involved in the cases of fiscal malfeasance in this cases I've cited above? NB: I used Wikipedia to compile the list.
Incidentally, why has no-one suggested or analysed how the probable uptick in Labour’s opinion poll ratings will impact on New Zealand First, which has historically been the beneficiary of major opposition party opinion poll softness- whether National or Labour?
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Dennis Frank, in reply to
why has no-one suggested or analysed how the probable uptick in Labour's opinion poll ratings will impact on New Zealand First, which has historically been the beneficiary of major opposition party opinion poll softness- whether National or Labour?
Depends on the extent of the shift. Trotter reckons it could be as much as 10% but I'm picking 6% - half of that from each of NZF & Greens. Depends also how keen the crucial 3-5% of centrist swing-voters that normally produce our election outcomes are to change the government. Economy's good, so that traditional determinant doesn't apply currently. I suspect centrists are seeing the Nats as stale, noticing the Nat sleaze factor kicking in again, but still waiting for the left to provide what looks like a government in waiting rather than a shambles.
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"economy's good" That rather depends on where you're sitting. Or maybe where you sleep.
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Dennis Frank, in reply to
Yeah. My comment was re that small group of swing-voters who normally determine election outcomes. Early July the Roy Morgan poll had those who think the country is headed in the right direction at 63% (the other two recent polls don't ask that question).
That evidence suggests no shift is likely. Complacency usually prevails in Aotearoa. But sometimes even centrists feel in the mood for a change...
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I sometimes wonder how much different would the whole controversy be, if it was a pale, blonde, blue-eyed woman MP committing the exact same acts as Metiria? Anti-welfarism commonly has a coded racism underpinning it, as was the case with "Cadillac-driving welfare queens" in Reagan's America.
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Kumara Republic, in reply to
That evidence suggests no shift is likely. Complacency usually prevails in Aotearoa. But sometimes even centrists feel in the mood for a change...
Overseas, such complacency has been bowled over by the Great Recession. NZ hasn't felt the full effects of it yet - it would most likely take the form a hard housing crash - but all the same, if middle NZ increasingly perceives Bill English to be hoarding like a tax haven client while hospitals struggle to get blood out of a stone...
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Yikes. David Clendon and Kennedy Graham are threatening to resign. Info seems ambiguous right now, but Stuff is presently reporting their resignations were accepted.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/95542553/two-green-mps-threaten-to-quit-over-metiria-turei
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/336665/two-green-mps-call-for-turei-to-step-down -
They've had 3 weeks to discover their principles. If they threatened resignation then, but kept it in-house, then I'd like to know what's been going on. I'll cut them some slack if they have been holding back from going public, while begging Metiria to quit.
But if they have only decided now, then they can bugger off. On grounds of political incompetence, if nothing else.
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Very sad. I have always had a lot of respect for Kennedy G in his parliamentary comment and work. The new list recruits must find this worrying as well.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
Purely speculative on my part but I wonder whether there are more revelations known on the inside that have since come to light and that was a tipping point.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Purely speculative on my part but I wonder whether there are more revelations known on the inside that have since come to light and that was a tipping point.
Based on my conversation with a longtime Green activist last week, my guess is that this has been brewing for a while among part of the membership as frustration with Metiria's perceived flakiness – she wants to go and be an anarchist again/she wants to be a Minister of the Crown – and the poor political handling of the confession is a final straw.
Maybe? I dunno. But it's terrible timing.
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Neil, in reply to
Shaw is in a difficult position.
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There's a bit more in the Stuff story:
A source close to the party has suggested the two MPs threatened to go, and the party was prepared to let that happen.
Green Party general manager Sarah Helm said the pair had done very little in the way of campaigning, and suggested they had been disgruntled for some time.
"Neither of these candidates have been campaigning for us all year. David's made one phone call, and Kennedy's put in about three or four hours worth of calls.
"My understanding is that both of them were not happy with their list placings either," Helm said.
The party is understood to be furious at how the two MPs have handled it - going outside normal parliamentary channels to tell media of their plans.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Shaw is in a difficult position.
Duncan Garner is claiming Shaw wanted Turei to step down. If so, backing him into a corner doesn't seem the best way to achieve that.
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Neil, in reply to
Ardern has the immunity pin at moment.
And the mystery box challenge is goose.
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Yes very. I am just so sad at our msm for making the story about Metiria as opposed to the utterly oppressive benefit regime. Benefit abatement was the issue which I suspect few nzers understand. I had no awareness of it at all until I read the Big Kahuna. Neither was I aware that super payments were higher than the unemployment benefit. That is beyond ridiculous. Surely a young adult looking for work needs more food and clothing than a retired adult? We so needed the conversation and particularly in an election year.
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I hope the two guys will publicise their views of the situation. I wouldn't put it past the lefties who still control the party to try and eliminate their right to do so. Could be a re-run of the schism that destroyed Values, if their position reflects the view of the majority of the party. Russel Norman's conference straw poll produced a two-to-one majority of the real greens over the leftists, but extrapolating that microcosm to the entire membership is a bit of a statistical stretch.
Nevertheless, the consensus process that has prevailed since the party origin in 1990 has finally fractured at the very top of the hierarchy. An historic occurence! Metiria will inevitably get the blame for catalysing the bad timing, and any drop in poll support for the Greens, but whether that is appropriate depends on the caucus decision to authorise and support her leadership stance. Or the lack thereof. If she briefed them fully, and they agreed to support her, they have no moral basis to resign that I can see. If she didn't, it's her problem - suddenly grown vastly greater than earlier today.
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Neil,
Somewhat alarmed the Greens could provide safe haven for two enemies of the people for so long.
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