Turia resigns
April 30th, 2004 at 3:24 pm by David FarrarMy spies in Wellington (I am in Thames as I type this!) report that Tariana Turia has resigned from Parliament.
I am told Radio Watea reported that she has decided to resign from Parliament over the foreshore and seabed issue and that the news was announced at 3pm on Radio Waatea 603am.
Turia is holding a press conference at Ratana Pa.
A by-election must be held between 4 and 8 weeks from now. May knock the budget bribes off the front pages. The Pm effectively will decide the by-election date.
UPDATE 1: NZPA has a story.
UPDATE 2: Turia resigns on 19 May so election will be late June or July.
UPDATE 3: Clark has just sacked Turia from Cabinet and the Executive.
No tag for this post.
April 30th, 2004 at 4:24 pm
Clark sacks Turia – sounds a bit like a “I’m quitting”, “No, you’re fired” scenario. Interesting times, will National stand a candidate in a by-election?
Vote:April 30th, 2004 at 4:42 pm
What a wonderful birthday present. It must be such a trial being a popular and competent Prime Minister – especially when you’re facing a by-election due to your own incompetence in a place where you’re about as popular as ham on a kosher deli platter.
Vote:May 1st, 2004 at 3:54 pm
‘Ham on a koshi deli platter’ – heh.
And the Herald reports Clark as being typically malicious to those who cross her:
“It is an astonishing lack of perspective to throw your job and the work you do for your people up in the air over this issue.”
Asked if she thought Mrs Turia had always intended to vote against the legislation, and not abstain as she had indicated earlier in the year, Helen Clark said there had been an element of duplicity.
“I think she has had it in her mind to do this for some time. But when push came to shove … she couldn’t look me in the eye and say that.”
The obvious implication being that Clark had been the very soul of integrity and reason through out the process. Not.
Vote:May 3rd, 2004 at 12:29 pm
Helen Clark bent over backwards for Turia, for longer and more generously than I think she should have. I would have sacked Turia in April, but the Labour party is just too nice to its people sometimes.
I’m glad she’s gone, in that she will at last be forced to confront the fact that in politics, you cannot achieve anything on your own. If she thinks she will have more influence as a lone independent backbench MP, she clearly has not been paying much attention to Donna Awatere Huata’s fate in recent months.
Turia either did not care about the damage this ridiculous episode would do to the Labour government, or she just didn’t understand how damaging it would be. Either is unforgivable, which is why I personally am glad she is now where she belongs — outside the tent.
Once the farce of a by-election is out of the way (here’s hoping there are no other candidates, so she doesn’t waste $450k of public money), she will fade into the obscurity she has asked for, barring the successful start of a Maori party which can sustain her. The chances of that are the subject of another discussion.
JC
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