Elections 2020 in Aotearoa

Sunday 18 October – the day after our  elections

Prime Minister of Aotearoa, Jacinda Adern

How lucky we are to live in a country where a warm, eloquent and truthful woman Prime Minister has been able to hold our nation together during the difficult times of the last three years.  We  hoped that Jacinda Ardern and the Labour-led government would earn another term in office in these elections and that the Green Party and the Maori Party would win some seats and be able to deepen  the response of Labour in a second term to include more social and environmental concerns.  

Election  night on Saturday 17 October was gripping for us at home watching TV  for the latest results, very exciting as it became obvious that the Labour Party and potential allies had achieved a landslide victory.

Chloe Swarbrick , Green Party, now MP for Auckland Central!

Rawiri Waititi, Maori Party, leading in Waiariki electorate

Labour , by midnight, had  64 seats, the Green Party 10 (including Central Auckland, won by young Green Party MP Chloe Swarbrick), and  the Maori Party in Waiariki  (Rawiri Waititi, to be confirmed, with a possibility also of a second to be won by Deborah Ngarewa-Packer, once special votes are counted) .

We also note with delight that the Labour Party now has a Maori caucus of 15 – 25% of Labour members of Parliament– and the Greens Caucus is 30% Maori and 40% Gay and Lesbian!!

National has shrunk to 35 seats, with its right-wing ally , the ACT  Party (Association of Consumers and Taxpayers) , rising dramatically from 1 seat to 10, still, even in a coalition,  unable to form a government.  NZ First and its leader  Winston Peters- a famed veteran of 40 years or more in NZ politics – is now out of Government . (Gladly,  the conspiracy theorists  in a couple of small parties did not register even 1% in total.)

The danger of this landslide victory for Labour-

their highest vote  in 50 years-

is that they will choose to govern alone. 

We would, as a consequence, have an essentially benign but conservative government, unwilling to undertake the transformative work needed to make our nation fairer, more inclusive, and more environmentally sustainable.  Because although the majority of our people have handled the Covid crisis well, there are huge inequalities –  housing shortages, employment disparities and issues of poverty and abuse –  to be sorted.  And we need new justice and welfare systems based on true Treaty partnerships between Maori and Tauiwi.

The Greens and the  Maori Party, would contribute to and support the changes needed; if they remain outside government their influence might be minimised.

So we are hoping the Prime Minister and her Labour colleagues will recognise the benefits of including members of both in a coalition government.  We now have two or three weeks of waiting for special votes to be counted, and coalition or other arrangements to be confirmed…