The unauthorised Green ads
June 15th, 2011 at 9:00 am by David FarrarWell that didn’t take long. I blogged about the ads yesterday and today they are gone. Andrea Vance at Stiff reports:
The Green Party has pulled “Gone Off Phil Goff?” ads – and apologised to the Labour leader.
The online notices were placed this week but were not authorised by the party, which was alerted to them via social media.
Although the Greens would like to attract disillusioned Labour voters, co-leader Metiria Turei said earlier this month that it would support a Labour-led government following the November 26 election.
Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said the ads were placed as an “experiment” by a member of the party’s campaign team. He apologised to Mr Goff.
The ads were up for “a day or so”, he said.
“It was a very small-scale experiment by a member of our campaign team that actually wasn’t authorised.
If the advertisements were not authorised by the party, then the team member who placed them has committed an offence under the Electoral Act. I hope the Electoral Commission will investigate, as it is a serious offence to place an ad on behalf f a party without authorisation.
The advertisement also did not appear to have an authorisation statement, which is potentially a seperate offence also.
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June 15th, 2011 at 9:09 am
$1 says it was funded by Parliamentary Services to.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:11 am
GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD MORNING TOAD!!!!!
Toad?
Ello toad…. come in toad….
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:19 am
“toad (2,889) Says:
June 14th, 2011 at 11:42 am
@peteremcc 11:03 am
Where’s the authorisation?
Exactly – no promoters statement. Makes me think it is not the real deal, and more likely someone acting maliciously or misguidedly.”
Yet again we seem to have some incompetence on the left. I assume Toad is on the campaign team and we know he is always honest so incompetence it must be….eh Toad?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:20 am
Who’s a naughty little boy then!
Pitty, it would have beeen a good move for the greens
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:28 am
CHFR they have already acknowledged it was one of their staff. Pull the other one it has bells on it. Smells like a talking point red heering to me.
Hey CHFR lean over to the terminal next to you and ask taod what his response is please.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:32 am
I think this is what CHFR means:
toad (2,889) Says:
June 14th, 2011 at 11:42 am
@peteremcc 11:03 am
Where’s the authorisation?
Exactly – no promoters statement. Makes me think it is not the real deal, and more likely someone acting maliciously or misguidedly.
Yet again we seem to have some incompetence on the left. I assume Toad is on the campaign team and we know he is always honest so incompetence it must be….eh Toad?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:40 am
Stiff?
If the advertisements were not authorised by the party, then the team member who placed them has committed an offence under the Electoral Act. I hope the Electoral Commission will investigate, as it is a serious offence to place an ad on behalf f a party without authorisation.
Really? Is there any part of electoral law that isn’t full of shit? What possible good can come from a law which threatens people with fines/jail time for posting a political ad without the party leadership’s authorisation?
Doesn’t the state have better things to do than to help enforce internal controls of advertisements by political parties. Important stuff like run petrol stations and ISPs.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:42 am
Lets just wait till yoad shows up and gives us the results of this mornings meeting shall we carion… shall we hold our breath while we wait?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:44 am
Could the left be doing this deliberately? There is no way a group this large could be this repeatedly incompetent without some sort of highly sophisticated coordination.
I wonder what their deviously fiendish end-game is?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:45 am
Ben, it could be to actively prevent the malicious posting of fake ads designed to denigrate the party it is ostensibly for. Would make sense on those grounds.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:46 am
@ Murray;
Screw that, I got inspections to do (again) I trust you will handle the situation with the decorum and gravitas required:)
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:54 am
@CHFR 9:19 am
No, I’m not on the Green campaign team, and I don’t know who placed the ads. It is clear from the Stuff story that the person who placed them, while on the Green campaign team, did not have the authority to do so. I agree it’s a poor look, but it was the action of an individual rather than something endorsed by the Party. I suspect he or she will be getting a good arse-kicking about now (in a loving Green way, of course).
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 9:58 am
Methinks it was a case of ‘run it up the flag pole and see who salutes. A case od plausible deniability.
Betcha Russel et al ‘knew”
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:02 am
People, it’s different when the left do it. There is a general rule of thumb to apply – if the left do it, it’s either “good”, or “not our fault”.
If the right do it, it is “pure evil”.
Glad we’ve cleared up the confusion.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:03 am
toad said “in a loving Green way, of course”
Some sort of group hug?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:04 am
Reckon LMS.
Ya fucked it up didn’t ya toad.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:07 am
In order to run an Adwords campaign, one must provide a credit card.
Any idea who’s card was used there, Toad?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:09 am
Ed Snack
Ben, it could be to actively prevent the malicious posting of fake ads designed to denigrate the party it is ostensibly for. Would make sense on those grounds.
No, it doesn’t make any sense at all. A political party is a private organisation. So is Coca Cola. If I post ads denigrating Coke then I get a trademark infringement notice within hours, and possibly defamation proceedings. It is against google terms of service to pass yourself off as someone else.
But if those measures are insufficient and political parties all end up the victims of malicious but temporary passing off – so what? Fines, lawyers, a legal apparatus and jail time is hardly a preferred alternative to the comparatively benign outcome of passing off.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:11 am
And on cue here is Toad with his talking point.
Thanks Carion still getting the hang of the bold thingie. Murray no Green lover here mate, sorry left off the /sarc.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:11 am
Hopefully the Green’s election campaign will include gems like this one
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2011/04/general_debate_14_april_2011.html#comment-819598
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:13 am
Ben you appear to be an idiot.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:16 am
Ben, so you get a bankrupt or utterly poor person to front it, give them lots of cash, run big ads with a party’s logo all over it, like, say, National Hates Ni***rs, (ni**er being the national hate word of the week), and then you sue them and win. Sounds useless to me, provided the front person don’t mind taking one for the team and the cash trail is sufficiently obscure.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:17 am
The Greens will probably get away with it…. the left have a knack for it. Nothing to see here eh Toad?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:21 am
plausible deniability it would seem.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:41 am
@Peter 10:02 am
It’s neither “good” or “not our fault”. It’s a cock-up by someone who should have know better. And no, I don’t know who (although I do know who the likely suspects would be), or whose credit card was used. What I do know is that Green Party General Secretary Jon Field is constantly reminding people in the party at all levels of the need to attach a promoter statement to election advertising and would never have approved an ad that didn’t have one.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:47 am
So DPF can no political party use Google Ads or Twitter or Facebook Ads or the like? Because they aren’t big enough to contain the authorisation statement in them – the link they lead to will do, but are you saying the click-through ad has to as well? What defines the advertisement in that sense?
Just out of interest is all, seems like a significant constraint on internet advertising/campaigning for the parties if so.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 10:51 am
Aw leave the Melons alone, what happened to the enemy of my enemy is my friend. As long as they are putting the boot into the Liarbore clowns then it’s all good.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 11:20 am
Jeez – can you imaging the outrage / the column inches / the TV time / the left leaning blog posts / the vitriol in the Stranded etc, that would have been devoted to this ‘story’ has the party at fault been the Nats or Act?
The Greens stuff this up big time and because Wed Wussell says it was a mistake by someone on their campaign team and everyone is sowwy, its now all OK.
The sheer hypocrisy of the left is staggering. And consistent.
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 11:28 am
Doesn’t seem like a big deal to me; unlike Labour’s loss (release?) of donor details. The ads were pulled pretty quickly and the Greens have explained what happened. The interesting thing is, though, the Greens must surely be targeting Labour voters, but perhaps don’t wish to do so overtly. How do they go about it, then?
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 11:49 am
I thought it was a great ad
Vote:I said ages ago that I thought that either the Nats or Act have a plant inside the labour party causing all this drama. It may well be that they infiltrated the greens as well. I mean, could professional political parties REALLY fuck up this much for so long without sabotage?
June 15th, 2011 at 1:07 pm
If this is true the watermelons are as befuddled as their Labour mates! What a laugh!
Vote:June 15th, 2011 at 8:29 pm
I would’ve hoped you wouldn’t be quite so keen to leap into this issue from that perspective, DPF, given your admirable support of the Free Speech Coalition. Frankly, if I want to spend my hard earned cash on a Google ad saying “Vote for the Yogic Flying Party” then I bloody well ought to be able to do so without some bureaucrat preventing me from so doing (provided I disclose that I’m the person behind it).
If a member of the Greens wanted to demonstrate a bit of independence and see if decoupling Wussel and Metiria from Phil’s teat would resonate with the voters, then the only person to whom they should be answerable is their employer – either the Party Secretary or Parliamentary Services (depending on what “member of the campaign team” means) not some stuffed shirts in the Electoral Commission. And if done on their own time with their own cash, they should be answerable to no one.
Vote:June 16th, 2011 at 6:54 am
“Gone off Phil Goff?” Yeah! Welcome to the crowd!
Vote:June 16th, 2011 at 7:25 am
place an ad on behalf of a party without authorisation
Just campaign type ads? We’re advertising for candidates at the moment and I presumed that was something we could just do, although there is obviously a strong party promotional element in it too. We have other types of advertising planned too, for events and public meetings, surely we shouldn’t have to comply with strict regulations for that sort of thing.
And at the same time we can promote ourselves however we like online – as long as it’s not paid for?
Vote: