by frog
There’s some discussion on Kiwiblog about the Green Party’s candidate list for the election this year. It’s probably an important point to make that the Green’s list is determined by every party member getting to vote on the list position of every candidate. As I said previously it’s a bit like a US primary. Unlike some other parties it’s much harder for celebrity candidates to push their way up the list. They need to win the support of thousands of members rather than a few key campaigns strategists. That means two things
- it’s a bit hard to keep preliminary draft lists secret when thousands of party members have copies of it, but that preliminary draft may not mean anything because it hasn’t been voted on yet, and
- expect there to be relatively few tantrums once the final list is announced because it will be the result of a democratic and open process.
And as for the big question from commenters at Kiwiblog, ‘who are these people and what do they all believe?’ Well, let me assure you, that they are all pretty environmentally aware wombles.
Published in Campaign | Parliament by frog on Thu, April 3rd, 2008
Tags: candidates, election, Frog, frogblog, green party, greens, kiwiblog, new zealand, Party List, wombles
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
I’m sure anyone who’s within the top ten on the list will certainly be very busy telling us what they believe before the election anyway, right Frog?
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At least the Greens won’t have High Court judicial reviews and injunctions being thrown around, claiming the candidate process is undemocratic and breaches section 71 of the Electoral Act 1993, which is what is is happening in the National Party.
Here is the injunction issued yesterday by Justice Panckhurst against the National Party on the application of one of its prospective candidates in the Selwyn Electorate.
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fwwog, choose careful up to no 10
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fwwog, choose careful, expected fwwogs 10.
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Id don’t normally take much notice of stuff that dad4justice says here or on any other blog, but this contribution from him over at Kiwiblog re the National Party candidate selection fiasco is fascinating:
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Frog
Why on earth would the Greens insist “gender equity”, surely the best people should be higher up the list irrespective of their sex.
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Oddly I agree, though im not sure what the exact definition is that the Greens use for this…4 of the top 5 are women on that Kiwiblog list anyway…But does it matter a damn when the order of the list is voted for by members anyway?
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Wheres BJ Chip today? Awhile ago he was telling me that he wanted the EFA to save NZ from US style campaigning. Now we learn from the Commission that any group can spend $120,000 to criticise any Party.
Well done Greens. We are getting even closer to the US system. Look to see labour and the greens outspent bigtime. And legally.
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Roman, $120K is about 10% of what the EB spent last time attacking the Greens and Labour in trying to get a National-led Government.
The whole point of this part of the EFA isto put some limit on it to level the paying field. Otherwise someone might come along at this year’s election and spend $10m. I think $120K is reasonable, as long as we know who is bahind the advertising. $1.2m is not.
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BB, as far as I know gender equity is only a policy for co-leaders. I could be wrong about that though.
Roman- that’s kinda unrelated to the Green list
The Greens have never opposed extra spending for third parties, just wanted it transperant and accountable.
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Toad,
But an unlimited number of groups can spend 120K each, thus making a nonsense of spending caps.
BTW:
“The German government has scrapped plans to raise the amount of bioethanol in regular petrol next year…”
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As Roman points out, the recent decision to allow the EMPU to be a third party means any two people can set up an organisation as a third party. And yes, that what toad and frog said they were against has happened. We now have unbridled volumes of money in the election.
Both from the conservative and the progressive side.
Made the comment (when the EFA was still the EFB that this would occur) and yep, BJ worse fears have beeen realised.
Have the feeling that this is the exact outcome the labour party wanted all along and the Greens, once again, have been strung along and left out to dry.
Because the swing voter is going to be heavily influenced by the various campaigns, the Green vote may well crumble (at which neither the reds nor blues will shed a tear).
The Green party list may for all intense and purposes be useless as without a constituant seat and or less then 5% list vote, the Greens may not even be in parliament.
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Toad
“Roman, $120K is about 10% of what the EB spent last time attacking the Greens and Labour in trying to get a National-led Government”
That little quote from Toad is the real reason behind the EFB, it is designed to stop a change in government nothing more or nothing less.
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# big bro Says:
April 5th, 2008 at 11:16 am
> That little quote from Toad is the real reason behind the EFB, it is designed to stop a change in government nothing more or nothing less.
actually, the real beneficiaries of the EFB in the long run will be the rural people and other traditional national supporters. It’s their party that’s been taken away from them by the influence of big money.
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It is not so much a gender equity requirement for the list as a wish to make sure the gender balance doesn’t get skewed too much. Clumps of men or women here or there are not important. Ari is correct that our use of gender split co-leadership for the main segments of the party is clearly articulated policy.
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The Greens might be better to select from the other end of the list; some real people…. Oh! and while I’m at it NZ First could be tidied up and become the NZ LifeStyle Party…
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I don’t get the make up of the “Greens” the list selection doesn’t represent the NZ community as much as one would expect. There seems to be a heavy weighting of John Minto types. The feeling I get is that there is a secret room or set of texts (ideology) which is circulated amongst the inner circle but kept dimmed for those outside that circle.
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Eh? Maybe secret midnight ritual sacrifices too?
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Silly me, but…
Any chance the green list could be based around green candidates?
You know, the ones on an environmental ticket?
Oh, you don’t have any of them?
Sorry to bother you, I just thought it might be a good idea.
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Unless you actually know these people, how do you know they *aren’t*??
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Here’s hoping!
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