Written By: - Date published: 7:37 am, November 22nd, 2019 - 57 comments
National’s attacks on NZ First’s Foundation are hypocritical in the extreme given that it also has a Foundation and has used this foundation to hide the identity of donors who have collectively potentially contributed huge amounts of money to the party.
Written By: - Date published: 12:23 pm, November 20th, 2019 - 74 comments
Simon Bridges has accused NZ First of engaging in the most significant breach of electoral law in New Zealand’s history. But has not ruled out working with NZ First in the future. And has forgotten about National’s neat partition of a $100,000 donation to hide it from the authorities.
Written By: - Date published: 8:07 am, November 4th, 2019 - 10 comments
Nick Kelly is a form NZ trade unionist and NZ Labour activist. He is a co director of Piko Consulting, and currently lives in London expanding Piko into the UK. The below was originally published on Nick Kelly’s blog
Written By: - Date published: 8:33 am, June 21st, 2019 - 95 comments
Nick Smith has complained that making it easier for people to vote by allowing them to enrol on election day will disadvantage the National Party.
Written By: - Date published: 8:47 am, March 4th, 2019 - 389 comments
The Green Party’s launching of a petition to seek changes to the electoral system has met with some Trumpian style rhetoric from the right.
Written By: - Date published: 10:32 am, March 3rd, 2019 - 61 comments
National is grooming the voters for another dirty ACT.
Written By: - Date published: 8:19 am, February 4th, 2018 - 108 comments
Changing National’s leadership will not help the conservatives regain power if they fail to address questions of why they lost the 2017 election. National may be the biggest single party but it is unlikely to stay that. And they have no remaining parliamentary partners.You can’t form a MMP government from that…
Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, December 12th, 2017 - 43 comments
National is pondering one of the realities of MMP. Without friends its chances of becoming Government are very limited.
Written By: - Date published: 9:17 pm, November 26th, 2017 - 154 comments
A rebuttal of Nick Smith’s claim to have “won the 2017 election, but lost the coalition negotiations.”
Written By: - Date published: 3:58 pm, November 25th, 2017 - 60 comments
No competition in this one, Nick Smith for showing that despite the 27 long years he has spent in Parliament he still has no idea how our electoral system works and for claiming there is an electoral convention that simply does not exist.
Written By: - Date published: 7:09 am, October 26th, 2017 - 69 comments
Some National supporters are proposing the Governor General direct coalition talks in the future. How would that actually work out?
Written By: - Date published: 9:16 am, October 21st, 2017 - 61 comments
National CRUSH puny parties! Why National no mates?
Written By: - Date published: 10:08 pm, October 19th, 2017 - 50 comments
While the Green Party delegates are debating a Confidence and Supply agreement in support of a Labour-led government, James Shaw made a speech to the press at parliament on Thurs night outlining the Greens’ response to the new Labour government and where the Greens might fit into that. UPDATE: the membership have endorsed the deal.
Written By: - Date published: 9:37 pm, October 19th, 2017 - 26 comments
NZ First have chosen to support Labour to form the next government of NZ and have secured a coalition deal. The Greens are in the process of making a decision about a Confidence and Supply deal before they make an announcement. Matthew Whitehead writes about what the options are and how Confidence and Supply agreements can work.
Written By: - Date published: 8:48 am, October 19th, 2017 - 103 comments
It appears that Winston is about to announce the decision of the NZ First party about their coalition partner today. For those who seem to think that coalitions should be formed with rapidity, they simply shouldn’t. That is the path to making stupid decisions, and I am yet to hear a single good reason to do it.
Written By: - Date published: 11:22 am, October 12th, 2017 - 33 comments
A timely reminder that we replaced FPP for very good reasons.
Written By: - Date published: 9:19 am, October 12th, 2017 - 195 comments
D day approaches. What will happen? Will we have a decaying toothless National Government moderated by coalition with New Zealand First or will we have something more exciting?
Written By: - Date published: 7:40 am, October 12th, 2017 - 26 comments
It’s the last day of coalition talks (probably). Peters has certainly created big expectations of “change”, but what they will mean in practice is still anyone’s guess.
Written By: - Date published: 7:17 am, October 12th, 2017 - 12 comments
If the Greens prioritise change over power, then the whole ‘they have no leverage’ rhetoric becomes less important than the fact that the Greens are necessary to form government but still have choices in how they participate in that.
Written By: - Date published: 9:07 am, October 10th, 2017 - 50 comments
MMP is challenging the traditional role of the Governor General in determining who should lead the Government after an election.
Written By: - Date published: 10:59 am, October 6th, 2017 - 64 comments
Important in the Green’s coalition deal-making process is the party’s political positioning, and the internal processes that the party is obligated to follow. Both of those things reflect deeper values around policy and decision making. Here’s a look at what processes the Greens will follow in the coming weeks and who will be involved.
Written By: - Date published: 10:26 am, October 1st, 2017 - 124 comments
This guest post looks at the ways that the national governments in Scotland and Wales operate. Their functional systems are effectively MMP, but they break up their list into regional areas which makes it easier to gain the voters to put regional issues into the wider debate.
Written By: - Date published: 4:02 pm, September 25th, 2017 - 45 comments
“Its not going to be a comfortable term. But it will probably be an exciting one.”
Written By: - Date published: 2:43 pm, September 25th, 2017 - 40 comments
The papers are full of the expected establishment hysteria today, trying to paint the election as a done deal for the Nats (I wonder what Peters will make of that?). Professor Richard Shaw: “Nobody’s won the election yet. The people who won the election are the people who form the government.”
Written By: - Date published: 11:55 am, September 24th, 2017 - 153 comments
Some post election thoughts on what James Shaw said last night, what the post-election options are, and that given the Left got a possible reprieve not an outright win, what are we going to do next?
Written By: - Date published: 7:01 pm, September 23rd, 2017 - 15 comments
The timing of this election’s results, how NZ governments are formed, and election stress.
Written By: - Date published: 7:20 am, September 22nd, 2017 - 101 comments
On current polling the next government could be Labour + Green + NZF. That would annoy a lot of Nats if they have more votes than Labour alone, but that’s how MMP works. English lied about this in the last debate, but apparently has since walked it back.
Written By: - Date published: 7:01 am, September 15th, 2017 - 56 comments
Labour’s surge under Jacinda Ardern has us all talking about Labour vs National – who’s in front. Exciting stuff, but there is something even more important going on. The mood represented by Labour + Green + the plurality of NZF supporters. The winds of change are blowing.
Written By: - Date published: 4:09 pm, August 18th, 2017 - 87 comments
Matthew Whitehead on MMP and the threshold, along with some commentary on the current polling situation.
Written By: - Date published: 10:07 am, July 31st, 2017 - 114 comments
With all the speculation about polls, it’s time to have a discussion about polling and the cold, hard facts around it. Is it good news for the left?
Written By: - Date published: 12:02 pm, July 26th, 2017 - 80 comments
Without a cup of tea in sight National has announced that it will asking supporters to vote for Act leader David Seymour in Epsom and United Future leader Peter Dunne in Ohariu.
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