Hopefully the people’s of Auckland Central will realise how awesome RAM will be in Parliament. I can promise some fireworks, as well as good, grassroots representation of ordinary Aucklanders!

But thanks for your obvious neutrality on this issue, Tim .

Instead you are going to vote for Oliver Woods, even though nobody has heard of him and he wasn’t even mentioned in the last poll.

Are you sure you aren’t Oliver Woods?

I think the Greens are good but I going to vote Oliver Woods and RAM. They seem like a dynamic bunch.

So Rotarua must have a different selection standard than say Rongotai (Russell Norman), East Coast Bays (Sue Bradford), Dunedin North (Metiria Turei), Wellington Central (Sue Kedgley), Epsom (Keith Locke) etc etc. But then I suppose you have to stand someone somewhere right?

And. despite frog’s tounge in cheek comment, the Greens will be standing one in Helensville too, David Clendon, who at 10 on the Green list has a good chance of getting elected.

If I was a clever Auckland Central voter I’d give Nikki my candidate vote and ACT my party vote

He surely can’t be a fulltime candidate??? When I went to uni, it was hard enough to work part time let alone start a business.

I think it is one of those elaborate radio station stunts.

I don’t really pay much attention to the candidates who don’t have a chance of becoming MPs. I happen to live in Auckland Central, and I don’t doubt that you’re working hard, and I encourage you in your efforts to become politically involved, but I honestly have never heard of you, nor your RAM party.

I can only report on what I see. I have seen Kaye out and about many, many times. She is highly visible. She has certainly knocked on doors in my street several times, and seems to have a whole team of people out there with her. If that poll that came out a few weeks ago is anything to go by, then what she’s doing seems to be working.

Nikki is the only really opportunity to knock Judith out of her castle.

And in terms of Auckland Central, Tim Ellis, I’m rather confused by what you’re saying about Nikki Kaye, though a quick Google search does show that you think highly of her already (no criticism implicit in that comment).

As one of the Auckland Central candidates getting around as much as I can (I’m standing for RAM in the electorate), I’ve actually not seen Nikki Kaye nor any of the other party candidates anywhere apart from once at a University debate.

During my doorknocking too nobody has seen her either. People are so utterly dissatisfied with both Labour and National in Auckland Central that a number have immediately offered me their vote simply because I was the first politician to doorknock their door since they moved in!

I don’t intend to criticise Kaye for this as she must be under a huge amount of pressure considering from what I understand she’s finishing off a degree at Auckland Uni (as I am too). Neverthless, I don’t like being told that she’s getting around everywhere (and seeing that constantly mouthed by the media) if she really isn’t doing that.

At any rate, she’s better than Tizard.

Cheers,
Oliver Woods

Tim, that could be one of almost any candidate’s assets. Auckland City Councillor Denise Roche is the Green candidate for Auckland Central. I know her well and think she would make an outstanding MP.

That is true, Toad, and I value your integrity in pointing out Judith Tizard’s uselessness. You are also quite right that many other candidates in Auckland Central, by definition, share Nikki Kaye’s attribute of not being Judith Tizard. However, no other candidate in the race is coming close to Judith Tizard, except for Nikki Kaye, who I understand from polling released publicly is ahead of Tizard by a nose.

Denise Roche might be a good candidate, I don’t know. I don’t live on Waiheke, so I haven’t seen her. I understand she is well regarded over there, but pretty much unknown in the CBD. I live in Grey Lynn, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen Nikki Kaye out campaigning in Auckland Central: at least a dozen in the last few months alone. Both times I’ve been to Waiheke in the last few months, I’ve seen Nikki Kaye there as well.

I don’t know if Kaye’s managed to clone herself several times to manage to be everywhere, or if there’s some secret National Party strategy to hire look-a-likes to help with the campaigning, but by contrast I haven’t seen Judith Tizard once in Auckland City in the last three years. Mind you, I don’t attend the Opera, so perhaps that explains it.

“Don’t know much about Nikki Kaye, but guess it would be difficullt to be worse than Judith Tizard as an MP (Taito Philip Field, Gordon Copeland, Winston Peters, Mark Blumsky, Brian Connell, Dave Hereora, and Bob Clarkson of the current lot excepted, I might add).”

You forgot, Keith Locke, Sue Bradford and Red Russel Norman.

Nope..and not for the reasons you suspect either, you know full well I only donate to Animal charities.

Actually…yes I will come to think of it, I have a feeling that there is no chance that you will stand a candidate so you can consider that bet well and truly on.

Just one condition, in the unlikely event that I lose the bet I do not want to know what that bloody charity does as I fear I might lose a considerable amount of sleep knowing I have donated to some communist workers group or the like.

I need to check the Gambling Act to see if this is legal. But if it is, bruv, would you still take me on if the charity of my choice were the Kotare Trust, of which Sue Bradford is a Trustee and for which Catherine Delahunty coordinates the training programmes?