Looking South
Whilst the attention of many within the UK maybe now north of the border in Scotland with the impending referendum, and rightly so! This week I want to flip things on their heads and face in the completely the opposite direction. This is both in a literal and political sense in terms of looking at New Zealand (NZ).
Now Wellington (NZ's capital) is approximately 11,567 miles as the crows flies from Sheffield (where I am writing this blog). But like in Scotland things are beginning to get very interesting down there in a political sense too. The reason being is that it's the general election campaign there at the moment, with the election due on the 20th September. This is where Kiwis (New Zealanders) will be voting for 120 members (MPs) for their House of Representatives, their equivalent to the House of Commons. For more general info on the elections, do use the link to Wikipedia below:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_general_election,_2014
A quick word up, NZ elections are different to those in the UK. The reason being is that they have proportional representation, something this blogger wants to see here too. The system they use is called Mixed-Member Proportional Representation or MMP. The essentials are that voters get 2 votes. One is for a constituency and one for a party list. Confused? Well this delightful video by vlogger CP Grey can probably explain in better than I:
NZ Greens (Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand)
The reason that I am interested in these elections is because of the strength of the Green Party in New Zealand. They currently occupy the coveted position of being the 3rd largest party in NZ politics. This is equivalent to the Lib Dems or UKIP in the UK, depending on which polls you care to believe. The size of the Greens in NZ is due to the proportional rep system that NZ has. As it allows for smaller parties to enter the political arena, and dare I say it have some influence on things.
Currently the NZ Greens have 14 MPs in the House of Representatives, all from the party list. 3 City councillors in Wellington City Council, 2 on Wellington Regional Council, 2 councillors in Dunedin and 1 rep on the Christchurch Community Boards.
Overall the Greens are a sizeable party on the political scene in NZ. The party also operates under a Male and Female Co-Leader system, like the Scottish Greens and unlike the Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW). The current co-leaders are Metiria Turei and Russel Norman (pictured below).
Metiria Turei and Russel Norman (current Green Co-Leaders).
As such, they are both the party's top 2 candidates on the party list (see link below).
In the last election in 2011, the Greens managed to increase their number of MPs by 5 from 9 to 14. As well as gaining 247,370 votes or 11.06% of the total vote. Now if the Greens here in the UK managed that we would be laughing! However, what needs to be taken into account is the fact that NZ has proportional rep and has a much smaller electorate (people who can vote) than the UK. Although it still is a great result none the less!
Election 2014
Now as I am a relative newby to NZ politics and no relatively little of the political issues in NZ, then I will try in this section to always to refer you to the correct web link. As who can explain Kiwi politics better than the Kiwis themselves! But here it goes…
From what I can gather (any Kiwi readers, please do correct me!) there are 4 main parties in NZ politics: National (Nats), Labour, Greens and NZ First. Links to all the parties' web pages can be found below in their respective party colours:
National
https://www.national.org.nz/
Labour
http://campaign.labour.org.nz/
Greens
https://www.greens.org.nz/
NZ First
http://nzfirst.org.nz/
This is in addition to a myriad of smaller political parties whose web details can be found below:
Maori
http://maoriparty.org/
Internet MANA
https://internetmana.org.nz/
United Future
http://www.unitedfuture.org.nz/
ACT
http://www.act.org.nz/
Conservative
http://www.conservativeparty.org.nz/
Deutschland und Neuseeland (Germany and New Zealand)
Currently, NZ has a National (blue) government that is led by NZ Prime Minister, John Key (pictured below). Key and his party managed to get 59 seats in the House of Representatives, on 47.31% of the vote.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_general_election,_2011
A look at the polling data from the 2011 election until now, would suggest that he just might do it again. A bit like Angela Merkel (pictured) in the German federal elections last year.
Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany looking famously displeased.
In another parallel to Deutschpolitik (German politics), the main opposition party (Labour) doesn't appear on its own to be putting up much of a fight to the Nats. Rather like the SDP (Social Democrats) they appear to be lagging behind the Nats in the polls (see below). Whilst the Greens in both countries (Bundis 90/Die Gruenen in Germany) hold around 8-12% of the poll. At the moment the NZ Greens appear to be doing better than their German counterparts!
The New Zealand opinion polls from 2011-present.
With the latest Fairfax Media/ Ipsos poll predicting that the NZ Greens will get 13% in the election on Saturday. With the NZ Greens now looking to be a permanent feature in NZ politics and the NZ Labour Party doing not so great, there have been talks of a potential Labour-Green coalition if the results go their way.
Again looking to Germany, there have been perfectly good examples of how a Red-Green coalition can effectively run a government. As shown by the first and second Schroeder governments between 1998 and 2005.
Closer to home for me, the local Green Party in York (my old stomping ground) is in coalition talks with the Labour party to run the city council. This is because Labour has lost their local majority over the council due to defections of councillors to other parties.
http://york.greenparty.org.uk/news/14/rainbow-alliance-possible-following-defection-of-labour-councillor.html
http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/11464977.Labour_loses_majority_in_York_as_councillor_quits_and_joins_Conservatives/
So a so called Red-Green and possibly some other coalition can actually work and there is no reason why it can't work in NZ. However, as mentioned previously the NZ Nats look likely to win on Saturday with the Kiwis polls as they are. Despite this though it still would be interesting to see how the NZ Greens perform and whether they can continue their steady march into the mainstream.
Further Links
Here are some interesting articles and extra links to the NZ Greens, if you should choose to read them. So for now over and out!
Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/nzgreenparty#!/nzgreenparty
Twitter
https://twitter.com/NZGreens
Greens top Facebook poll
http://www.mad-daily.com/greens-top-nats-facebook-poll/
Policy
https://www.greens.org.nz/policy
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/user/nzgreenparty
Kiwi Greens UK
http://kiwigreens.org.uk/
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