Login Required

This content is restricted to University of Auckland staff and students. Log in with your username to view.

Log in

More about logging in

In this week's Caucus, the team discuss the Green Party strategy that may have (inadvertently) saved Labour. Was it OK to put Metiria Turei under such scrutiny? What next for the Greens?

Guyon Espiner, Lisa Owen and Tim Watkin guide you through the maze of politics to Election 2017, with frank and forthright discussion.

  • 1Three weeks ago, Metiria Turei rolled the dice with nothing less at stake than all the gains the Greens had made in recent elections - from a 5-6 percent party to a 10-12 percent party. Frustration at their inability to get into government and Labour's stumbling performance over the last three years saw the Greens opt for the high-risk high-reward strategy. But was it a naive strategy, and how well was it implemented? First, Turei attacked Winston Peters as racist. Then, in the second act on 16 July, she revealed that she had lied to Work and Income about her living circumstances when she was a solo mum in the 1990s. She admitted then that the confession put her own career and the party at risk. It turned out to be a prophetic statement, not that it played out that way at first. Her revelation, along with Labour's messed-up intern scheme, saw the Greens leap in the polls, and Labour slump. The Greens were delighted; although taking votes off Labour was doing nothing to change the government, as per the party's mission statement, it was maximising its votes and strengthening its hand. But the dice hasn't stopped rolling. Labour's slump prompted a leadership spill and ushered in the Jacinda Effect. Worse for the Greens, Turei's story of having to lie to support her child was found to have new fish hooks - such as that she had, in a fit of youthful hijinks, committed what could be called electoral fraud. Then it became clear some Green MPs - Kennedy Graham and Dave Clendon - didn't like Turei's refusal to condemn other beneficiaries today for doing what she did herself in the past. The stench of disunity was coming off the party, and new polls yesterday and today showed the party's support plummet back into single digits, while Labour roared into the mid-30s - the minimum of where they need to be to lead a new government. Inadvertently, ironically, and at the cost of her own political career and her party's reputation for taking the high moral ground, Turei has breathed new life into Labour and done more to change the government than she probably dared hope. It's just not happened the way she would have wanted to. In this week's episode - with me, Guyon Espiner and Lisa Owen - we discuss this intense week in New Zealand politics, which climaxed in Turei's resignation as co-leader. Was it OK for journalists to put Turei under such scrutiny and how does it compare to how other parties have been treated? And what next for the Greens? Guyon asks whether they risk going under MMP's 5 percent threshold and what that means for the centre-left vote. And we discuss where this leaves Winston Peters and New Zealand First.

Primary Title
  • Caucus
Episode Title
  • How Metiria Turei saved the Labour Party
Date Broadcast
  • Thursday 10 August 2017
Start Time
  • 19 : 00
Finish Time
  • 19 : 30
Duration
  • 30:00
Episode
  • 6
Channel
  • RNZ National
Broadcaster
  • Radio New Zealand
Programme Description
  • Guyon Espiner, Lisa Owen and Tim Watkin guide you through the maze of politics to Election 2017, with frank and forthright discussion.
Episode Description
  • In this week's Caucus, the team discuss the Green Party strategy that may have (inadvertently) saved Labour. Was it OK to put Metiria Turei under such scrutiny? What next for the Greens?
Classification
  • Not Classified
Owning Collection
  • Chapman Archive
Broadcast Platform
  • Radio
Languages
  • English
Captions
Live Broadcast
  • No
Rights Statement
  • Made for the University of Auckland's educational use as permitted by the Screenrights Licensing Agreement.