Jim Anderton made a great and irreplaceable contribution to our society and democracy. Without his leadership of NewLabour and the Alliance – and his support of MMP – we might still be stuck with a narrow, two-party, first-past-the-post political system – like Britain, Australia, Canada and the United States. We owe Jim a lot.
Presented as introductory comments at a workshop hosted by the Anti-Bases Campaign in Blenheim, 28 Jan 2017, and updated to reflect changes made to intelligence legislation in the Intelligence...
Prior to the last election Labour, NZ First and the Greens all opposed the current deployment of New Zealand troops to Iraq. Labour specifically promised to withdraw them, but nothing has happened yet. Now Australia is leaning on our government to extend the deployment beyond its current end date in November. Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop made that plain during her visit here last week.
Parliament's intelligence and security committee was in the news recently when Labour's Andrew Little nominated Winston Peters for membership.
Little also proposed expanding the committee to include a Green member...
The bill before Parliament to stop party-hopping has been misnamed. The Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill should be called the Party Conformity Bill because it threatens MPs with ejection from...
Most New Zealanders want us to have an independent foreign policy. They think we are already independent to some degree. If pressed they would cite our nuclear-free status, or...
I am heartened by the way Labour and the Greens are talking up justice reform and the need to reduce prison numbers. Justice Minister Andrew Little told TV3’s Nation last week that everything is on the table, including reform of the bail, parole and sentencing legislation.