Jordan Carter

Stuart Nash has again blogged on Recess Monkey clarifying his post after he joined a list of Labour’s enemies.

Just to clarify, however, my initial post wasn’t actually about Louisa or the Marriage Equality Bill at all, but about the strategy Labour has pursued so far this year.

That is right, Nash was not responsible for that strategy. So who was?  How much strategic input has say Grant Robertson or Jordan Carter had?  Can they all just blame Trevor now Nash has said “not me”?

One thing is for sure, Nash is confused about his mate David Parker.

I know that David Parker has been doing some serious thinking about this and he is a man of huge integrity and intelligence; and a man of courage. I expect to see some pretty revolutionary ideas to come from his office.

Right so this is the same David Parker who allegedly breached the Companies Act for filing false declarations to the Companies Office when of all people, a trained lawyer and Attorney General?

Mr Parker and Helen Clark described Mr Parker’s declarations as a “mistake” and Mr Parker said he believed many other people filed such declarations to “cut corners”.

By ticking the box, he saved himself $400 or $500 a year in audit fees.

“In respect of my own life I’ve done a lot more in my life than a lot of people have and overall I am proud of my achievements, but I’m certainly ashamed of this particular mistake,” he said last night. With the benefit of hindsight I was a bit glib in the way I ticked the form and sent it in.”

Parker is the last man who can comment about declarations, returns and forms and it has not held him back from being the next big thing in Labour years on.

The hypocrisy of the Labour Party know no bounds.

During the 2011 election campaign much was made of Labour’s working man roots, especially the miners.  It seems that Labour has not only turned its back on the working man but has also driven one of its key strategists to work for the Oil and Gas industry. Jordan Carter ecstatically tried to break the news to his acolytes:

Omg best news of the decade.. And I can’t even tweet about it

— Jordan Carter (@jordantcarter) September 5, 2012

And Martyn Bradbury is alluding to some sort of putsch against Pagani on his little read hate-blog.

It now seems an open secret that in fact John Pagani has left of his own free will and accepted a role with NZ Oil and Gas.

Of course, Pagani isn’t there as a ‘working man’ but he’s going there as another lobbyist.  What becomes even more interesting is that he is the third former Labour staffer to go to the mining/drilling industries.  Mike Munro is working for Todd Corporation and Deborah Mahuta-Coyle signed on as a lobbyist for PEPANZ (the Petroleum industry’s lobby group).  Technically it may actually be four since Pagani is replacing another former Labour staffer Chris Roberts. Perhaps this explains Labour’s claimed change of heart on mining where they now share the same stance as National.

So what finally drove Pagani out (again)? Was it Mallard’s constant nitpicking over every word in every press release – only to then have a tantrum, go to his office and ring his media mates to bitch?  Or was it the slow creep of the ‘gaggle of gays’ as they took over the Leader’s office? Word has it that Mold has even turned from being Shearer’s number one supporter to now being the ultimate fag hag to Robertson.

Shearer’s strain to decide whether to appeal to middle New Zealand and ‘Waitakere Man’ has now disappeared. May be Sio and Nash are right?  May be Labour has lost the plot and got lost in the Jordan Carter like rhetoric.  After all, how many people who have experienced the real world are left in the Leader’s corridor?  All are too busy navel gazing, being terribly academic or are the ultimate beltway junkies.  How is Shearer ever expected to succeed with advice coming from those people?

Shearer is now a lonely, invisible man.  Who does he turn to?  Shearer’s instincts will be to include his opposition in his tactics… the silly man hasn’t worked out that in politics having no one on your side is a dangerous position.

Cactus Kate has spent a considerable amount of time analysing both Stuart Nash’s short and to the point blog post of the other day and Jordan Carter’s long winded post talking about the strategic blunders or triumphs (depending on your point of view) of Labour.

Carter invokes the birth of the welfare state in his post on equality which is nonsense in itself given the welfare state back then was not meant to be as broadly applied as it is today. And we all know it because fundamentally that is what the man on the roof is all about where people are sick of the breadth of the welfare state and how so few New Zealanders are actually net taxpayers. Labour cannot actually counter this because their spokesperson Jacinda Ardern actually agrees with most of what Paula Bennett is saying.

Even Labour’s run at child poverty (whatever that is) was muffed dreadfully because the public’s first response was one to again state the obvious, what the hell are the parents doing with the welfare assistance they are receiving? And it highlighted why people keep having children they cannot ever afford.

Carter has uneloquently attempted to take “equality” as discussed in the #marriageequality debate and stretch it further. What he is failing to grasp is that there never really was a debate as 80 MP’s voted for it (even John Banks) and the only person really against it was Colin Craig and 50,000 petitioners from Family First. Grant Robertson noted in the shockedhaughty tone that only he can pull off, that few people stayed after the marriage equality debate to support the $15 an hour minimum wage bill.

Why would they? GLBT supporters didn’t sign up for that and are discerning enough to fight their own battles. Many are sick of paying for other people kids while forking out to attempt to have their own. Many are also sick of being taken for granted by Labour and are voting Greens or even National. The gay community itself is not just a left one that Labour can automatically rely on to support their every cause. And as Nash effectively illustrated, the causes seem to be numerous. Too numerous that people have disengaged.

Labour may be tits, but they get some things right and will be a threat in the future when they get a real leader.

One of the great things Labour do is train up activists. They have a summer school and a campaign school. They bring in a lot of people regularly and train them up. Participants loved it. Jordan Carter blogs about it:

I’ve spent the weekend in Hamilton at the first Young Labour campaign school.

It’s been an interesting couple of days for a number of reasons. The turnout was fantastic — around about sixty attendees not counting presenters. There was a good broad range of topics, from elections to issues campaigning and thinking about messaging and communications.

Ten years after the first Summer School, which is a Labour Party event organised by Young Labour, a campaigning focus like this is well timed and much needed. Campaigning is core business for a political party and we don’t make enough effort to teach people how to do it.

National’s weak party leadership means National does not have a Summer School. It does not have a campaign schooleither. Its Candidates College meets once a year (Nov 2-3 this year) and participants are lectured at, learning nothing useful except in National you are expected to sit and be lectured at without complaint.

Lord knows what the Young Nats do but ten years after Young Labour set up their school the Young Nats have not followed suit. This shows massive lack of leadership from the Young Nats presidents, the party president and the General Manager.

The latter two are far more interested in shutting down training than encouraging it, and don’t want anyone with any independent thought anywhere near the party. They even question prospective Candidates College members very closely about their friends and acquaintances with stern warnings issued by a board member about continued friendship with those who shall not be named.

The joke is they try veiled threats about candidates future prospects when in all likelihood they will be nowhere near the organisation of the party in less than 3 years.

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Labour have appointed Tim Barnett as their General Secretary. That makes three if not four of the most powerful positions in the Labour party all part of the Rainbow faction.

Grant Robertson as Deputy Leader, Alistair Cameron as Chief of Staff, now Tim Barnett as General Secretary and of course Jordan Carter, a key policy influencer. Of course there is also Charles Chauvel, Louisa Wall, and Maryan Street.

Labour certainly looks decidedly top heavy in the Rainbow stakes, not that it should affect the votes of Waitakere Man in the slightest. Perhaps now Labour will have the courage to actually use the words same-sex marriage in their policy rather than skirting around the issue.

Little wonder (if you will excuse the pun), that Shearer has bought off the union faction by ceding control of the party to them with their constitution changes.

The Labour Party has appointed former Christchurch Central MP Tim Barnett as its new general secretary.

He takes up the position on July 26 replacing Chris Flatt who has been appointed secretary of the Dairy Workers’ Union.

For the past year Barnett has been a consultant in Southern Africa “developing political leadership to address the HIV epidemic”, Labour said in a statement.

Labour president Moira Coatsworth said Flatt had been a very strong leader during challenging times, and left the party in a stronger financial position and in good health.

“Tim comes to this role with considerable experience as a political representative and manager of organisations, at a fascinating and exciting time in our history. He will be driving implementation of our Organisational Review, forging a campaign-ready Labour machine nationwide and spearheading our fundraising. All key tasks towards achieving Labour-led government from 2014,” she said.

It could be a distinct possibility, especially when Jordan Carter, a member of Labour’s governing council and the most senior member of their policy council talks out loud on Facebook about abolishing private schools:

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Jordan Carter is once again putting himself forward for the policy council of Labour.

Here is his email begging for a vote and here is his CV/brochure.

So here we have Jordan Carter campaigning on an explicitly left ticket.

Let’s take a closer look…

“I’ve held that role for the past three years”

Yeah, and how did policy work out at the last election, Jordan? Was that a triumph you’re seeking to better this time around.

“we need bold, left wing policy in 2014″.

Really, that’s his pitch? Understand clearly that a vote for Carter on policy council is a vote for Labour to shift further left than it was last year.

“I also want us to be, and become, a party that welcomes debate about ideas and the future.”

“Be and become” eh? I think I see what you’re trying to fudge there Jordan. How about you think about being a party that welcomes debate.

No doubt Chris Trotter and Martyn “DBD” Bradbury will blog forth in support.

Some interesting things have come to my attention.

Of course last week there was a nice opinion piece by David Cunliffe in the Herald.

Then this weekend he delivered a big key note speech where Chris Trotter and other commentators were specifically invited and is now being seeded nicely across the left wing blogs.

Then there are the moves by Moana Mackey who is busy trotting around visiting MPs. Of course Moana was supported in her list ranking by none other than Jordan Carter and Alistair Cameron, Shearer’s new chief of staff. I hope she can count better than the last time she ran the numbers.

Jordan Carter has burst forth on his blog again, in support of David Cunliffe’s nicely timed keynote speech.

Someone pointed out to me too that I may have been a bit wrong about Alistair Cameron’s loyalties…that they quite possibly weren’t with Grant Robertson, given his close professional and personal relationship with former president Mike Williams.

Who then pops up this morning commenting in the media today about how secure Shearer is….anyone fancy a Tui.

He told 3 News Firstline this morning, that Mr Shearer has the support of the vast majority of Labour MPs.

“I rang around some caucus members yesterday… and there’s no mood for change at the moment, I can tell you that.”

Mr Williams says if Labour does decide to change leaders, again, it must do it by the end of the year – two years out from the next general election.

As they say the Ducks are lining up…the wonder is if one particular Duck is lining up on the right side or the wrong side.

With Shearer off being entertained by corporate lobbyists on the weekend instead of shoring up his support, things are looking dodgy for him to continue much longer.

Only a hardened socialist could think that the only way to match Australia is for stronger unions:

Voters will have cottoned onto the fact that this country won’t match Aussie wages without stronger industrial relations laws that give people more power at work.

Riiiight, how about political parties that are willing to dig up our resources instead of opposing it at every opportunity? That is what Australia is doing, they are digging up their mineral wealth and selling it to the world, meanwhile people like Jordan Carter, apparently a “thinker” in the Labour party wants stronger bloody unions to get us on an even keel with Australia.

You know what, a miner earning $175,000 cares about three fifths of five eighths of bugger all about a strong union every week as his pay packet comes rolling in.

A massive stoush has broken out over who said what and even who didn’t hear what over the homophobic name calling of Trevor Mallard.

David Farrar has been called a liar as has the Wellington Central Act candidate Stephen Whittington, by Jordan Carter and by Grant Robertson. Green MP Kevin Hague has backed up Farrar and Whittington.

In the debate Charles Chauvel has stated that he has never heard the “tinkerbell” insult and that if he had he would have said something. Well the man must have clothe ears.

In the video of the incident where Trevor Mallard clearly, both over the sound system and recorded in Hansard calls Chris Finlayson “Tinkerbell Charles Chauvel can be seen sitting there not more than 3 seats away from Trevor Mallard.

Charles Chauvel cannot claim not to have heard the insult. The video evidence suggest otherwise. It is looking more and more like it is Labour MPs and apologists who are the ones doing the lying. Here is another shot just after Mallard has been pulled up for his insult.

You really have to wonder why these MPs tell bald faced lies when the video evidence is available to all to prove their lies.