liberation

NZ Wikileaks: the Wellington US Embassy cables - UPDATED

The mass of Wikileaks cables relating to New Zealand ('Kiwileaks') have suddenly exploded into New Zealand political scene. I’ve got a copy of a 613-page PDF file of all the recent Kiwi Wikileaks – which you can download here: Wellington US Embassy cables.  The Herald on Sunday published details of the leaks yesterday. The paper published a few of my comments (‘Bryce Edwards: Foreign meddling laid bare’), and also in these stories: Key exposed over Dalai Lama and NZ-US peace deal sacrificed for votes - cable.  This blog post provides an extensive list of links to some initial stories and analysis in the mainstream media and blogosphere. The list is being updated regularly. [Read more below]

A New Zealand First comeback?

There is a lot of talk in the media at the moment about a New Zealand First comeback. This is because some recent opinion polls have indicated that the party has public support in the range of 3-6%, suggesting that the party might make a return to Parliament in the 2011 general election, and thereby be a significant force in deciding whether Labour or National will get to lead the next government. But is there actually a political-electoral space for Peters and his party? Does anyone really want to buy what Winston Peters is selling? This is an open question, and so it’s anyone’s guess as to whether NZ First will be victorious in its quest to return to Parliament next year. The party will obviously need to cross the crucial 5% threshold to do so, but according to iPredict the party is currently predicted to win 5.0% of the party vote in next year’s election, although somewhat paradoxically, the iPredict market also currently says that there is only a 31% chance that Winston Peters will be back in Parliament (see here). This blog post discusses these issues and also reports on the state of New Zealand First with some information from a party insider. [Read more below]

 

Pansy Wong’s dubious solicitation of political funding

Although Pansy Wong has survived the investigation into her use of travel perks, the NBR is today reporting another political finance potential scandal based on her fundraising for the National Party. It has been revealed that Wong has raised large amounts of money for the National Party in 2007, including $200,000 from one fundraising event where apparently one Chinese businessman paid $50,000 for one of John Key’s ties. All of this money presumably was passed onto the head office of the National Party. Yet the funds are not easily identified in the donations declared by the party to the Electoral Commission for 2008. Why not? Matt Nippert’s article in today’s NBR quotes me discussing the issue. This blog post elaborates on the issues. [Read more below]

 

Review of New Zealand politics in 2009

 

The year 2009 was a hectic one in New Zealand politics, partly because it was the first year of the new National Party Government’s term in office. At a general election in November of the previous year, National had ousted the Labour Party from its three-term tenure in office and formed a single-party minority government with support agreements with the Act Party, the Maori Party and United Future – all of whom gained ministerial roles outside the cabinet. In this first year, the new administration was both ideologically centrist and highly popular, being challenged only on difficult issues relating to the economic recession, political finance controversies over MPs’ expenses and various race relations questions. The following blog post examines these issues via a ‘Review of New Zealand politics in 2009’ which has just been published as a peer-reviewed journal article in the top political science periodical, the European Journal of Political Research (in the December 2010 edition). As well as looking at how the National Government fared in 2009, it also briefly analyses the main issues in politics (such as the economy, social issues, political finance scandals) and the changes in the other parliamentary political parties. [Read more below]