Kiwiblog

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS of his support for Shearer and mentions others also supporting Shearer. Off hand I count the following endorsements:

• Matt McCarten
• Matthew Hooton
• John Tamihere
• Willie Jackson
• Michelle Boag
• Deborah Coddington
• John Pagani
• Jon Johansson
• Chris Trotter
• Cameron Slater
• Phil Quin
• Lew Stoddart

Now that’s just members of the VRWNLLWC who have endorsed Shearer. Add to that the apparent support of Phil Goff, Annette King, David Parker, Grant Robertson and Trevor Mallard. Has any leadership candidaate ever had such a wide variety of people endorsing them?

However for Shearer to win, he will need more than endorsements. He will need to pick up his game substantially from his performance on Q+A today. Being unable to even name your Climate Change spokesman is embarrassing.

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

In three months the World Cup will be over and all focus will be on the other competition this year – the general election.

A mate of mine was confidently predicting to me that if the All Blacks lost, Prime Minister John Key was toast. I’ve heard this sort of crystal ball gazing in every election.

Labour will need a lot more than an All Black loss to dent Key’s chances of re-election.

They’d need our rugby team knocked out in the first round; followed by mayhem on a scale of this week’s English riots; unemployment to soar past 10 per cent; and interest rates to go through the roof.

Even then I suspect none of it would stick to Key.

So before the World Cup drowns out politics, I thought it might be interesting to analyse the chances of each of the political teams.

National: The only question is whether they can rule alone or will need a coalition partner.

Anything less than 46 per cent of the vote will be seen as a defeat for Key. If he gets more than 50 per cent he’s the new Keith Holyoake and will remain Prime Minister for as long as he likes.

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

US counts financial costs of tea partiers

More damage was done to capitalism this week than any communist revolutionary could have ever dreamed possible.

Matt has it all wrong. The drop in the markets isn’t because Tea Party supported Congressman insisted on spending cuts. It is because the spending cuts did not go far enough to stop US debt growing. The massive deficit and debt is due to a series of Presidents and Congresses spending way more money than they had. Clinton was the one near exception.

Everyday Americans, sick of both parties, rose up and said no more spending increases we can’t afford. Thanks to them, the US may one day get back into surplus – but it is a long time off.

Anyway I would have thought Matt would have liked the Tea Party – like his UNITE union, they don’t like paying taxes. The difference is the Tea Party campaigns to change the law, while UNITE simply takes its employees PAYE tax and spends it elsewhere, rather than passing it onto the IRD as required by law.

The country’s official unemployment is more than 9 per cent and is people’s number one concern. Poll after poll show people want more expenditure on jobs, health and education. Yet the tea partiers – funded by the super wealthy – have forced the Obama administration to cut these three items.

Until now every sane economist will tell a government to spend money when an economy needs to grow. This country is going in the opposite direction.

The 9% unemployment rate came after the biggest spend-up in history. Obama asked for and got a huge fiscal stimulus, in the hundreds of billions. He claimed it would stop unemployment reaching 7%. Instead it made 10%. The myth that the Government can spend itself out of trouble has been dispelled by the evidence.

If that isn’t enough Obama has a Supreme Court with a majority of Republican appointees approving laws allowing corporations to give unlimited amounts of secret funding to politicians.

Not secret. Simply companies in the US, are like companies in NZ. They have to disclose their donations, but there is no limit on them.

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

I can’t see how Labour can keep whistling in the dark over its dismal public support.

I don’t know how its leader, Phil Goff, can keep pretending he has a chance of winning in November.

Two polls this week showed the gap between National and Labour remaining at a yawning 20 per cent. When was the last time a government polled consistently so far ahead of its opposition?

Every poll these days seems to tell the same story: John Key and his party can rule alone. People like Key and trust him.

We have a prime minister whom two out of every three New Zealanders prefer.

That means even voters of other parties support him over their own leaders. Extraordinary but true.

That is a point few have cottoned on to. Even amongst Labour voters, the majority prefer Key over Goff to be PM.

No one, surely, believes that a Goff-led party has any show.

It is clear the whole Labour caucus is made up of a bunch of gutless wonders, resigned to coast along for the next six months and lose, rather than get a backbone and make the change.

Labour needs a new messenger if it has any chance.

Frankly, it’s a dereliction of duty for the current caucus to flag this election away. If it does then it doesn’t deserve any support from its core constituency.

It would have a better chance in November if it put the names of its current MPs on a wall and then have some kid throw a dart at it.

Whoever gets their name lanced by the dart gets the job.

That would be hilarious. There would be 41 MPs silently thinking “Please, please don’t land on my name” and two MPs praying “pick me, pick me”.

It’s a bit over the top but it’s a better strategy than the one Labour’s running now.

Matt shouldn’t give away his ideas for free.

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

The major problem the Labour Party has is that it doesn’t seem able to look like they are trying to win.

It’s clear they are sleep-walking to defeat. They look tired and lacklustre.

Frankly, they look like a bunch of losers and it annoys me. Everyone knows the game plan is that, through a lack of an alternative option, they let Goff run until the election then replace him. Then supposedly they will make an effort for the elections in 2014.

That may well make sense, given that it’s plainly obvious they are a hopeless opposition, so why would anyone think they’re ready for government?

Ouch.

I look forward to its completed party list to see whether it promotes new and current talent and takes the cleaver to its non-performers.

Otherwise, it is simply rearranging the deck chairs on a ship that may well sink.

I hope for their supporters’ sakes they do the former.

The Labour list will be interesting. They actually did a pretty good job in 2008 of promoting new talent ahead of some of the existing caucus. They need to do that again.

So many stories, I’ll try and cover them in the one post.

In one story, David Fisher in the HoS writes of how Andrew Little and Phil Goff have still not discussed the Hughes affair. Amazing.

David Fisher in Herald on Sunday writes in a second story on previous allegations (one of which was blogged on Whale Oil around a year ago), and on the fact that Goff knew for longer than he initially said (again a point Whale has made). Fisher also reports that Tizard says it would be nice to be an MP again so she can say “stick it up you” to those who didn’t want her back (which is most of the Labour Caucus and none of the National Caucus).

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

Why is the Labour opposition so hopeless? I had assumed that leader Phil Goff was competent enough, albeit lacking in charisma, to survive until the November election.

Now I don’t. His performance this week has been appalling.

Ouch. And more:

The handling of the Darren Hughes incident exposes Goff’s hypocrisy, his lack of judgment and, more importantly, his political smarts. You couldn’t get a more inept management of a crisis.

It was always a long shot for Labour to win November’s election, given the dismal polling of the party and their leader.

Goff’s mismanagement this week has taken any chance now.

McCarten concludes by saying Goff has to go. Ironically this will probably make Goff safer as Labour MPs won’t like being seen to do what McCarten says!

Jonathan Marshall in the SST has an interview with the 18 year old’s mother in this story. And in another story, Georgina Beyer and Chris Carter both say Goff should go. Again, this may help Goff

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

In two quick simple decisions John Key transformed this year’s election, turning the tables on his opponents.

Setting the election date for November 26 was signalled well in advance. But I can’t remember any time when an incumbent prime minister didn’t keep the opposition (and the country) guessing on an election date right up until he or she popped up to the Governor-General to resign.

This one small perk of power was to keep your opposition off guard about dates. As someone who has had to run a few campaigns, it matters.

Not knowing when you can book venues, travel and events does matter.

The assured manner Key has gone about his announcement shows a confidence that should unnerve Phil Goff. To most voters Key has merely made a practical and transparent decision without any apparent political advantage.

The ones who will most be grateful to Key for the early announcement will be the Electoral Commission – they get nine months to organise an election, instead of six weeks. It means venues for polling places can be booked with certainity.

But the real stinger that deserves high praise was Key’s kneecapping of National nemesis Winston Peters.

Over recent months Peters has been slowly but consistently gaining support in the polls to the point where he could quite possibly once again have become the kingmaker in any post-election negotiations.

In one swipe Key has almost certainly dealt Peters a mortal blow. More importantly he got Goff as well. It’s a bold and gutsy move. Key made his fortune by taking calculated risks and he’s made what I suspect is a winning chess move. …

In one swoop Key gives us two choices of government after the election – a government led by him or a Labour/NZ First/Greens alternative. Voters make your choice.

I was astonished Goff and Peters claimed Key was naive and arrogant. It was a masterstroke.

And even better it was the right thing to do.

Goff has no choice but to accept Peters as his ally and this will hurt him. Any votes NZ First now gets won’t come from anyone who wants Key as prime minister.

Indeed. A vote for Winston is a vote for Goff to be PM, and a vote for Labour is a vote for Winston to be a Minister.

Key is positioning himself as the forward-looking positive leader and Goff is saddled with the old bodgie. Given the fact Goff was first in cabinet 36 years ago, to say he’s looking a bit tired is an understatement.

26 years ago. But it has been 42 years since Phil Goff joined the Labour Party.

Goff’s cautious reshuffle of his frontbench reinforces the problem. Only one change in the front bench at the same time as every old Helen Clark hack keeps their job.

It signals Goff does not have control of his caucus, he is timid by nature or he hasn’t got enough talent in his caucus. I suspect it’s all three.

I think it is more the first.

Matt McCarten hands out his 2010 political awards:

• Redemption Prize: Shane Jones
• Slow-Learner Certificate: Pansy Wong
• Bad-Taste Award: Those labelling Auckland Central as the “battle of the babes”
• Giant-Killer Prize: Pete Hodgson
• New-Blood Award: Hekia Parata
• No-Prisoners Award: Hone Harawira
• Try-Hard Certificate: Phil Goff
• Best-Minister Prize: Gerry Brownlee
• Best-in-the-Game Supreme Award: Len Brown

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

John Key, a successful corporate speculator himself, has announced that if the National Party is elected again then he’d see that as a mandate for selling off the rest of our public assets.

Except he has said no such thing.

In a follow up to the story I blogged about yesterday, Rebecca Stevenson at the Dom Post reports:

The Council of Trade Unions wants an explanation from Unite on why it failed to pay the IRD more than $36,000 in PAYE on behalf of its employees.

Unite, one of New Zealand’s largest unions, owed IRD over $130,000 for the year ended March 2009 (its most recent filing), including more than $57,000 in unpaid GST. For the same financial year its liabilities outweighed its assets by more than $170,000.

It is the unpaid PAYE that will be causing most concern, as this is in fact money owed by the employees to the IRD, and UNITE has appropriated it for its own purposes. It is the sort of stuff that the newspaper boss Maxwell did – but on a much smaller scale.

Unite head Matt McCarten confirmed yesterday that the union owed money to the IRD but said he had made choices to pay for union campaigns rather than clear the debt. “I don’t shy away from these decisions, I make the calls.”

He said Unite paid $8000 in PAYE each month to the IRD but kept incurring late payment penalties. He claimed not to know exactly how much it owed the IRD.

The late penalties do add up – as many businesses know. But if it was a deliberate decision to keep running campaigns, instead of paying off the debt, then few will have sympathy.

He agreed it was not a good look for a workers’ union to fail to pay its employees’ tax.

I don’t think Matt realises how bad a look it is. The next time UNITE or Matt calls for greater government spending, this issue will arise.

CTU president Helen Kelly said Unite did good work in an area that was difficult and expensive to organise. That required it to juggle its finances. “All unions are always short of resources.”

However, when questioned on Unite’s tax failure, she said: “I need an explanation for that”.

I’m not sure I would say all unions are short of resources. The combined wealth of the union movement puts the Business Roundtable, Business NZ, and the Chambers of Commerce to shame. I did a blog post a couple of years back comparing them.

Daniel on Twitter pointed me to the audited accounts for the UNITE union, which are filed with the Registrar of Incorporated Societies.

The accounts to 31 March 2009 reveal the following:

• Their liabilities exceed their assets by around $172,000
• Their bank account is over-drawn to $63,000
• They owe the IRD around $130,000
• They have an agreement with IRD to pay the debt off at $8,000 per month
• They have a $30,000 loan from the National Distribution Trust, which presumably is associated with the ND Union.

This is a very bad look for a trade union, as some of their unpaid tax is PAYE. That means that have been taking the tax off their staff, and rather than pay it to the IRD, have kept onto it.

Employers who do that are labelled thieves and bad employers. It is seen as worse as not paying income tax because it is not tax on your own income, it is tax on behalf of your employees and you are acting in a role as trustee to deduct and pass on.

The 2010 accounts have not been filed. Hopefully they have paid back the IRD.

I like Matt McCarten – he is a genuine advocate for his beliefs. But to advocate that the state should be spending far more money, and have your own union not paying their taxes, exposes you to charges of hypocrisy.

Labour came far too close to doing something that has never ever happened before in recent New Zealand electoral history – having an Opposition lose a seat in a by-election. No Government has won a seat off the opposition in the 59 by-elections since 1936.

And even worse it was not a marginal seat – it was a safe seat that has been held by Labour since 1938 (in that its predecessor seats were also Labour).

I was hoping the majority would be below 3,000 – my pick had been 2,500. I never thought it would almost drop to a triple figures and get as low as 1,080. In some ways it was the ideal result. If the margin had been 500 or so, then you’d be kicking yourself for not doing that extra bit to win it. And if Labour had actually managed to lose the seat, then Goff would be goneburger, and National doesn’t actually want Goff rolled.

So what happened? Well as I blogged during the week, I didn’t expect there to be a uniform swing – I expected different swings in different areas. I’ve divided the seat up into four areas – Porirua East, Porirua West, Northern Suburbs and Kapiti.

Porirua East

In 2008 Laban got 82% and Parata 9%. There was basically no swing here at all with 2010 as Faafoi got 82% and Parata 11%. The total vote was 72% of 2008, and McCarten got 4% here.

This shows how hard it is to win Mana, when one large portion of the electorate votes Labour 9:1 over National. Even if the rest of the electorate votes 3:2 National over Labour, it is hard to compensate for such areas.

Porirua West

In 2008 Laban got 59% and Parata 28% so still very much core Labour areas. There was a good swing here as in 2010 Faafoi got 51% and Parata 35%, so the margin dropped from 31% to 16%. The total vote was 66% of 2008, and McCarten got 6% here.

I had been expected Porirua West to be like Porirua East, and not swing much. But in some booths in Titahi Bay Hekia lifted her vote share by 9% and Faafoi lost 15%.

Northern Suburbs

These areas are pretty solid Nat, In 2008 Laban got 35% and Parata 54%. That was good enough, but there was a massive swing here as in 2010 Faafoi got 25% and Parata 67%, so the margin grew from 19% to 42%. The total vote was 74% of 2008, and McCarten got 2% here.

Kapiti

The Kapiti area voted Labour last time, and flipped to National this time. And what is more extraordinary about this is it happened despite noisy local opposition to a new expressway.

In 2008 Laban got 46% and Parata 41%. There was a big swing here as in 2010 Faafoi got 37% and Parata 47%, so the margin went from +5% to Labour to +10% for National – a 15% net movement. The total vote was 69% of 2008, and McCarten got 3% here.

Polling Places

In 17/42 polling places the vote share for Labour dropped by 10% or greater. That is huge.

Interestingly the advance votes actually had Faafoi getting a bigger vote share than Laban did in 2008. This reflects my view that Hekia got real momentum in the final week as several community leaders endorsed her, but by then many advance votes had already been cast.

CR v CL

Matt McCarten didn’t achieve a great result (but he did get lots of signatures for his petitions) and the Greens had a solid third. ACT was battling it out with Legalise Cannabis for 5th place. What was the total CR and CL vote in 2008 and 2010?

In 2008 Labour & Greens got 60% of the electorate vote, and National/ACT got 37%. In 2010 Labour/Greens/McCarten got 57% and National/ACT got 42%. So even taking the minor parties into account, you had the centre-right close the gap by 8% in Mana!

Historical Comparisons

Labour did manage to retain the seat, but they had a massive swing against their candidate. Again, this is historically very rare in by-elections. I’ve gone through the last few by-elections to note what happened:

• 2010 Mt Albert – remained safe for Opposition
• 2004 Te Tai Hauauru – not contested by major parties
• 1998 TKC – big swing against Government
• 1994 Selwyn – big swing against Government
• 1993 Tauranga – not contested by major parties
• 1992 Wellington Central – was marginal Labour and majority increases slightly for Opposition
• 1992 Tamaki – big swing against Government
• 1985 Timaru – falls to Opposition
• 1980 East Coast Bays – falls to Opposition (Social Credit)
• 1980 Onehunga – Opposition holds comfortably
• 1980 Northern Maori – stays with Labour
• 1979 Christchurch Central – Government comes 3rd
• 1978 Rangitikei – Government loses to Opposition (Social Credit)
• 1976 Nelson – Opposition increases majority
• 1977 Mangere – Opposition holds comfortably
• 1977 Pahiatua – Government holds

So this has not happened in the last 35 years – an Opposition almost losing a safe seat in a by-election.

The closest we have is 1992 Wellington Central, and they have a number of things in common

• Both held in the first term of a new National Government
• Both held two years into that term
• Both had popular retiring MPs (Wilde and Laban)
• Both had Labour put up a candidate with no background in the party (Laidlaw and Faafoi)
• Both had a high profile third party candidate on the left (Denis Welch and McCarten)
• Both times the National candidate was married to Wira Gardiner (Pauline Gardiner and Hekia Parata)
• Both times the National candidate had stood in the previous general election
• Both times Labour got a narrow victory on the by-election

The really interesting thing is that in the 1993 general election, Laidlaw lost the seat to Gardiner – it was the only seat lost by the Opposition in that election.

Kris has won the seat, but it is now a marginal seat, and he is going to have to work very very hard in the community to match Hekia and retain the seat in 2011.

UPDATE:

A reader sent me this graph, of the ten largest polling places in Mana. It tells a big story about how Cannons Creek saved Labour.

NZPA report at NBR:

Prime Minister John Key was mobbed in Porirua today as he campaigned for National in the Mana by-election.

A group of about 10 supporters of independent unionist candidate Matt McCarten crowded around Mr Key when he arrived at North City Plaza, and they were joined by Labour Party activists backing Kris Faafoi.

Mr Key couldn’t hear the people he was trying to talk to over screams and chants, and one determined woman activist repeatedly got in his face as he tried to meet voters.

Excellent. I can’t wait to see the news tonight. Nothing gets more votes than a group of idiots screaming at the PM.

Derek Cheng at the Herald reports:

The mood was jovial until an argument broke out between Mr McCarten and Labour supporter Shane Cheriton.

“I’m an individual who thinks you’re just full of crap,” Mr Cheriton told Mr McCarten.

“Here’s a bunch of trendy liberals who think they can get out with a bunch of slogans and things will happen. No one will vote for you mate, because everyone knows that you’re going to split the vote.”

Mr Cheriton, who said he would vote for Labour on Saturday, traded verbal blows with McCarten’s supporters, while Mr McCarten shot back that Mr Cheriton was doing the Labour Party’s dirty work.

Nice to see Matt getting heckled – he has done enough of it over the years.

But I do wonder if Mr Shane Cheriton, is the same Shane Cheriton mentioned in this Tenancy Tribunal order.

Andrea Vance at Stuff reports:

Labour leader Phil Goff has admitted National’s Hekia Parata could win the Mana by-election if turnout is low.

His press secretary, Kris Faafoi, is standing for the seat, traditionally seen as a Labour stronghold. But yesterday Mr Goff said a low turnout would “jeopardise Labour’s hold on the seat”.

Goff is trying to do two things here. The first is to motivate Labour supporters to turn out and vote. He is right – turnout is important.

The second is he is trying to make the seat sound marginal, so that if Labour’s majority is slashed, it does not reflect so badly on them.

Mana is one of their safest seats. It (and its predecessors) have never been held by National. Mana has a larger majority than Lianne Dalziel in Christchurch East, Trevor Mallard in Hutt South and Jim Anderton in Wigram.

A few people point to the party vote margin at 2,500 and say this means it is not safe for Labour. But they make a fatal mistake. The releveant comparison with the party vote is between right and left, as both right and left voters will vote tactically on the electorate candidate (many green voters vote for a labour candidate and many ACT voters vote for a National candidate).

So what was the party vote for the right in 2008 in Mana? 39%. And the left vote? 53%.

In the median electorates, the right is 8% ahead of the left on the 2008 party vote. In Mana the right is 14% behind the left on the party vote.

Now this does not mean Hekia can not win. She has been winning endorsements from some non traditional National voters. Even Willie Jackson and John Tamihere have come out and said people should vote for her or Matt McCarten (partly because they fronted up onto their radio show).

But the reality is that no Government has ever won a seat off an Opposition in a by-election. I’ve checked back over 90 years. If Hekia wins, or even comes close, it will be a seismic event.

On The Nation this morning they reported that there is a real split in the Pacific Island vote in Mana, which has traditionally been very strong Labour. They interviewed Liz Tanielu the head of the Teaaomanino Trust which is the biggest pacific island service provider in the region. She says she traditionally votes Labour but that Faafoi is an outsider, and she is angry they could not find a single local to stand, while Hekia has been active for some years in the electorate and “walks the talk”, and that the by-election should not be a party vote but a vote on who will be the best MP.

Then they had on Api Malu, who was representing 40 pacific island church ministers. He says they are looking for people who have worked with them, and that Hekia Parata has impressed a lot of people, and the leadership with what she has done.

Also on the show, Tariana Turia endorsed both Hekia Parata and Matt McCarten as candidates who would make effective MP for Mana.

By coincidence in the Dom Post this morning, Porirua Deputy Mayor Liz Kelly also endorsed Hekia:

Porirua Deputy Mayor Liz Kelly has backed National Party candidate Hekia Parata to win the Mana by-election.

Her prediction will cause ripples as Labour’s Kris Faafoi has been favoured to take the seat, which is viewed as one of Labour’s safest. The party has always polled strongly in the Pacific Island and Maori communities.

Local leaders suggested yesterday that Mr Faafoi’s lack of experience is seen as a drawback.

Ms Kelly, an independent councillor, said Ms Parata’s work in the electorate had not gone unnoticed. “The feedback I’m getting is that Hekia is very popular … There is a lot of support because she’s been working the whole time.”

Mr Faafoi was a “nice guy” but “there’s no history” with the electorate and some voters resented that.

And a local community leader:

Samoan community leader Paula Masoe said Ms Parata had won over a lot of Pasifika supporters. “She’s a hard worker and we respect people who work hard for our community. I’m really happy that someone like Kris put their hand up. But it’s not time for him yet. I don’t want the sweat of our people to be put on someone who’s not ready yet.” …

Experience was valued in the Pacific Island community, she said. “It’s not about having someone who is Pacific Island there, you’ve got to have somebody who is able to carry the huge responsibility and he probably will. But not yet.”

There was a “strong feeling” among local voters that Mr Faafoi was imposed on the community by the parliamentary Labour Party.

“Labour needs to look at themselves because we don’t want to be treated like the poor relations. When they look at putting someone in to speak up for us I’d like to think that they’ve considered a whole lot of other people of our community that have been involved in Labour.

And also in the Dom Post, Chris Trotter effectively endorses Matt McCarten in his weekly column:

I asked Matt if he’d heard of Slavoj Zizek – the Slovenian socialist currently setting the cat of principle among the fat, pragmatic pigeons of the European Left.

“I’m busy, Chris,” he chuckled, “of course I haven’t.” “Well, Matt”, I replied, “Zizek is challenging Europe’s social democrats to stop looking over their shoulder at the European Central Bank; to govern “as if they were free”.

“Maybe that’s what you should ask the Mana electors, Matt. To stop looking over their shoulder at Labour. Could be your slogan: ‘Vote – as if you were free’.”

And in the NZ Herald, Audrey Young says Parata should be promoted to the Ministry:

Pansy Wong’s resignation from the Cabinet a week before the Mana byelection presents Prime Minister John Key with a golden opportunity.

He has the chance to add fresh blood to his ministry without the usual resentments around reshuffles and a chance to show Mana the calibre of National’s Hekia Parata. …

promoting Parata before a byelection – even to a minister outside Cabinet – would tell the Mana electorate something of the calibre of the National candidate.

It is clear that some traditional Pacific Island Labour voters are saying they people should vote for the best MP, not for the party. They are right – this is how MMP works.

One rule of politics is to never believe a rumour until someone denies it!

Claire Trevett in the Herald reports:

Sue Bradford and Matt McCarten have rejected speculation they are about to start a new left-wing party – but neither will rule out doing so at some future point. …

Yesterday, both Ms Bradford and Mr McCarten said there were no current moves to do so and they had not discussed the idea with each other.

However, both believed there were virtues in the idea.

What I find interesting is that neither McCarten or Bradford see the Greens as a suitable vehicle.

I don’t agree with Matt McCarten much but normally his columns are honest opinion. I really can’t say that about today’s HOS column:

The NZ Actors’ Equity has been trying forever to reach agreement on basic conditions for actors from New Zealand film producers. Jackson point blank has refused to even meet.

As that is the role of SPADA, not Peter Jackson. Even the media understand this now.

Also NZAE do not represent most actors. Despite that SPADA had been trying to meet with them for the last 18 months.

To get Jackson’s attention, the union wrote to their counterparts around the world asking for support, up to and including a possible boycott of Jackson’s next film.

Not a “possible” boycott”. There was a boycott. It was voted on in June and remained in place until mid October.

But here’s some good news. NZ screen producers have agreed to meet Equity to negotiate standard terms and conditions for actors.

In the meantime, they will use the internationally union-approved Pink Book as the minimum basis for performers’ contracts.

This is a huge victory for Equity.

A huge victory? Jesus Matt – you are in another dimension on this one. This “huge victory” is what SPADA tried to get them to do 18 months ago. Equity has been refusing. Claiming this as a victory is like Germany claiming the Treaty of Versailles as a victory.

Is Andrew Little the only union leader honest enough to admit that Equity screwed up massively? It seems so.

Since Matt McCarten announced he was standing for Mana, I’ve been thinking about how well he could do. My initial inclination was that would probably receive modest support.

But then it occurred to me that he could siphon off a lot of Labour votes by highlighting their policies on wages, and that he has been walking the walk on those issues, with Labour being a reluctant convert to some of them – and Kris having no history with advocacy for those on low incomes.

Matt can walk to up voters and ask them if their kids have ever worked for McDonalds, and if so Matt is the one who got them paid adult rates.

Matt can walk up to voters and ask them if any of their family have been on the minimum wage, and how he got 300,000 signatures on a petition to raise it to $15.

Matt can point out that Labour refuses to commit to a $12 minimum wage until Greens and NZ First forced them to do so, and how they refused to commit to a $15 minimum wage in Government until his union got all the sugnatures.

Matt can point out they kept youth rates in place for eight years, until the Greens forced Labour to vote to get rid of them.

If Matt succeeds in defining the race as “Who will be a more effective advocate for the low paid workers of Mana”, then he could do quite well.  And the irony is that Labour was planning to make wages the centre-point of their campaign – yet if they do so they may face Matt saying “Who do you think will be a more effective advocate for increasing low income wages – the former TV reporter or me”.

UPDATE: Bryce Edwards has a must read analysis of McCarten and Mana.

UPDATE2: For a different view, Phil Quinn blogs on why McCarten will struggle to get even 400 votes.

So Matt McCarten is standing as a UNITE backed Indpendent for Mana. What does this mean for the by-election?

The only certainty is that it means it will be a lot more interesting and even exciting, and will have more media coverage of it. Beyond that, it depends on a few things.

Most would conclude it is a slap in the face for Phil Goff and Kriss Faafoi. Rather ironic to have the candidate who won thanks to the union block votes, to now face a candidate from another union.

Does it mean Labour could lose the seat? To be honest, at this stage no one knows. It is safe to say that Matt is unlikely to pick up many votes from Hekia, so that helps National and Hekia.

What we don’t know is whether he will get 500 votes or 5,000 votes. That may depend on what issues he campaigns on.

It is even possible this could help Faafoi and Labour. A battle on the left could get more left wing voters voting. And if Labour are tactically cunning, they could try and position themselves as the moderate party between National and McCarten.

So this announcement is a slap in the face for Labour, and no one in Labour will be happy with McCarten’s candidacy. But that does not mean this has suddenly become a three-horse race, or that it is suddenly a marginal seat. Mana is very tribal Labour and UNITE has fewer activists on the ground here than in Auckland.

As I said, the only guarantee is things will now be more exciting. I wasn’t planning to attend any of the Meet The Candidates meetings, but now I might just go along to see what stunts Matt gets up to with chicken suits and the like.

UPDATE: The Electoral Commission has announced eight candidates for Mana. They are:

Nice name for the Libertarianz candidate!

The SST reports:

Left wing union leader Matt McCarten has performed a triple flip flop over endorsing a candidate for Auckland Council’s Albany ward.

McCarten formed the website supercitypicks.co.nz to help voters select a left-leaning Auckland Council in the upcoming local body elections. …

But yesterday McCarten withdrew his support for Williams entirely.

“Originally I thought progressives should support Andrew Williams. But my leftist and even centrist mates gave me a biff on two fronts,” McCarten wrote.

“That he’s made his city a laughing stock and  he’s totally self absorbed and even his own allies have deserted him. The other reason is that he knows he had no chance to win as mayor and is deliberately drawing votes away from the only other candidate Len Brown who can beat John Banks.

“Privately he claims to support Brown, yet is helping Banks by not telling voters his real position. On that basis he’s a fraud and shouldn’t be supported by progressives.”

McCarten said Slater was “the only other candidate I know in that ward with any chance of winning”. He said the blogger was right of politics but “has a social conscience, does volunteer work and has a good brain”.

Yep that’s right, Matt McCarten did endorse Whale Oil for Council. And he called Andrew Williams a fraud.

One can only imagine the howls of outrage and anguish on the left. Matt’s own UNITE staff probably threatened to picket him. And so he flipped again:

However less than 24 hours later McCarten had withdrawn his support for Slater and replaced it with a new endorsement. “My progressive advisors tell me I should be supporting John Kirikiri as the best of the rest”.

Position No 3.

But, when Stuff called McCarten today to ask why he was making constant changes to his Albany ward endorsements he said he would be removing his tick for Kirikiri and reinstating Williams as the preferred contender.

“I hadn’t done my homework but I have now read all of the candidates’ policies and have decided Williams is the man for the job.”

He said Williams had been “an embarrassment with his behaviour” but had the best policies “and policies are how we should judge the candidates”.

I disagree with Matt. Policies are important. But so is judgement, temperment, and rationality.

Following his removal from McCarten’s endorsement list Williams let rip on Facebook about the well-known union leader.

“He should know better than to make such irresponsible statements about me a sitting mayor. I don’t even know the man, have never had a conversation with him, so it’s extraordinary that he would comment like that. But very telling that he initially endorsed that disturbed psycho nutter Cameron Slater then withdrew it.”

When Williams does rants like that, the term “disturbed psycho nutter” seems like a form of projection.

Matt McCarten writes:

It can be boring when someone talks about themselves. Today I’ll take the risk.

I know I get into scraps and sometimes overstep the mark in clipping my opponents – and there’s always a few of them waiting impatiently for my demise.

They may not have to wait too much longer. I was diagnosed a year ago with the killing kind of cancer.

I’m only sharing this as the news seems to be getting out and some people seem to think I’ll soon be taking to my bed and softening my political views.

No such luck, I’m afraid. Most cancer sufferers think they can beat the odds. Why should I be any different?

Again, words are so inadequate. I both like and respect Matt McCarten and am incredibly saddened by his news.

I hope Matt stays around to see a Labour/Green Government elected. I reckon that is on track for 2020, so no skivvying off before then

John Armstrong writes:

The left-wing activists who stormed the Sky City Hotel last Sunday in an inevitably futile attempt to force their way into the National Party conference should take a good hard look at themselves.

The noisy fracas with security guards inside Auckland’s Temple to Capitalism certainly got the activists what they wanted – top-of-the-bulletin coverage on that evening’s television news. But if they think such tactics are going to mobilise public opinion against the Government’s just-released package of workplace law reforms then they should think again.

Their actions were widely viewed within the Labour Party as unhelpful, though no one was saying so publicly.

Sue Bradford and John Minto charging a Police line just sends people into the opposite direction.

While others on the left have been quick to label National’s package as a “class war” being waged on the country’s workers, Labour has avoided using such over-the-top language.

When it comes to portraying National’s policy prescription, there is a danger of crying wolf. More so because much of the package is based on National’s 2008 election policy. That prescription pleasantly surprised some left-wing commentators for being so moderate and not a return to the Employment Contracts Act. They cannot now turn around and argue that the package released by Key last Sunday is designed to wage class war.

And many aspects will actually be welcomed by employees such as the ability to trade leave for pay.

Even the 90 day trial period will be popular with many employees I reckon. We’ve all seen new people hired at a workplace and within a week or two it is apparent they are not up to the job. It isn’t just the bosses, but the other employees, who often have to carry them until they finally leave.

Matt McCarten writes in the HoS:

After he defeated John Howard for the prime minister’s job the world swooned. Rudd was part of a new wave of intelligent, moderate social democratic leaders led by Barack Obama. John Key was also part of this new order.

But governing successfully, and winning campaigns, require two different skill sets.

Obama is struggling with that predicament. Fortunately for this Government, Key has made the transition seamlessly.

Rudd, however, has been a train wreck, stuffing up one policy after another.

Rudd’s arrogance and flip-flopping put him offside with the electorate.

And he had never been popular with his colleagues.

You have to hand it to the Aussie Labor Party: if its leaders don’t perform, they are quickly and efficiently dispatched.

The party’s had a string of leaders in recent years and if new leader Julia Gillard can’t save it from electoral defeat in a few months it will shaft her, too.

The party’s New Zealand parliamentary counterpart doesn’t have the same ruthless survival instincts to oust its leaders when it can’t win.

Our Labour MPs, in their hearts, knew Helen Clark couldn’t win the last election and know Phil Goff can’t win the next one.

But, as they did with Clark, they’ll go into denial and pretend that as long as they plod along they’ll still have a chance.

Ouch. Tough words.

Unfortunately, softness on the left isn’t restricted to national politics. Questions are being raised about its standard bearer Len Brown’s durability in the Auckland mayoral campaign.

Until this month he looked unassailable. But his stumbling over his credit card use made him look weak. His key advisers, by blaming his problems on a media beat-up, make him look like a whiner. No one votes for a victim.

Anyway, it’s legitimate for the media to put him under scrutiny as voters do want to know whether he’s up to job. His responses tell us a lot about what sort of person he is.

Brown has a winning way with voters face-to-face but he does have to convince us he can be a capable chief executive, given some of the recent spending in Manukau City.

Brown had better lift his game because other contenders are starting to smell opportunity.

Theatre director and actor Simon Prast’s entry into the mayoral race on Friday helps the right wing’s strategy of encouraging a split to the anti-Banks vote. Prast should be able to garner up to 10 per cent of the vote, and that will harm Brown.

I assume there will be more “celebrity” candidates. More worrying for Brown, though, is a strong rumour that a poll has been commissioned to test Stephen Tindall’s chances.

I’ve been hearing Labour are starting to panic over the Brown candidacy, and are looking around. If Tindall enters, they may swap their support to him.

After his display of head slapping, Len Brown should perhaps be known as Loosehead Len – and this is one of the kinder things being said. I’ll start with Kerre Woodham:

Just when I didn’t think things could get any worse for Len Brown, he goes and does it again.

And before his fans leap up and down and say I’m part of some spooky right-wing conspiracy, I’m not.

He had my vote before the events of the last couple of weeks. Not for any particularly compelling reason. I just thought that if we had a centre-right government, it balanced things up a bit to have a centre-left mayor. …

Then came the claims of persecution and the protestations of being victimised. That was unattractive, but what really turned me off was the performance Brown gave to the Manukau City Council on Tuesday night.

When I say performance, I don’t for a minute think he was acting. Far from it. I think he believed every word when he cried out passionately that he’d risen from his hospital bed after a near-fatal heart attack for the love of the people.

That when he walked in the door, looking like a bloody skeleton, it was because he cared, not because he could put a few more cups of coffee on the mayoral credit card. I’m sure that’s true.

But emotional blackmail is hardly a rational response to requests for financial accountability. Nor is beating yourself about the head and face.

That was weird. In his soliloquy, Brown repeatedly hit himself in the face and chest, saying if people had a problem, they should come and see him.

That was enough for me.

You need somebody a little less … overwrought … as mayor of New Zealand’s first super city.

And that is from a Grey Lynn liberal who was planning to vote for Len Brown.

Next Matt McCarten. Matt is as left as you can get:

This brings me to the parallel universe of local government politics in which Labour Party-backed mayoral hopeful Len Brown has credit card problems of his own.

His use was careless at best and, as many Aucklanders don’t know much about him, his misuse will worry them. But it was his response, like Carter’s, which is more revealing.

The cutting up of his credit card on television was a cheap stunt. Was he saying he can’t be trusted with a credit card to do his job?

Well perhaps he was, as he seemed incapable of keeping proper receipts and he outright refuses to comply with his Council’s own policy to identify who was at a dinner.

His explanation on why he used his card to buy personal items was because his wife had their joint card raises more concerns. Everyone knows couples can get a card each on joint accounts.

And as they are signature cards, you can’t borrow each other’s card. That one had porkie all over it.

It’s good he apologised but his emotional presentation to his council was disturbing. His opponents can’t believe their luck and are predictably using it as evidence Brown is unstable and loose with ratepayers’ money.

But Len explained away his actions as being the Maori way to do things. Fortunately the SST has talked to some actual Maori on this claim:

But broadcaster Willie Jackson rejected that. “The spin about it being a Maori gesture is rubbish. I’ve never heard anything like it.”

Jackson said Brown’s team had made a poor decision in claiming a cultural element to the antics.

“I don’t know what the hell they were talking about, having been a Maori every day of my life,” Jackson said. “Len needs to harden up or he’s going to gift this campaign to John Banks.

“This campaign was his to lose and he’s doing a good job of that.”

Willie is also of the left. This is hardly the vast right wing conspiracy. Willie was also backing Brown over the credit card before his display at Council.

Once Were Warriors star Temuera Morrison said what Brown did was “more like caveman stuff”.

He said haka participants slapped their chests and thighs “to get unison with everyone and feel the rhythm”. The gesture to invite people to “come and get me” usually involved poking out the tongue.

“I don’t know what this guy was doing,” Morrison said. “This guy is on another planet.”

Ouch.

Auckland University Maori studies expert Dr Ranginui Walker was also unconvinced. “In the old days widows used to cut their breasts and chests when their husbands died or when warriors were slain.

“But I’ve never heard of men doing any such thing.”

Well we can at least be relieved Loosehead Len didn’t start cutting himself on live television.