Paul Goldsmith

Local government is the breeding ground for political parties, where newbies cut their teeth and prove themselves. It is also an incredibly important part of our system of governance, with dodgy councils being able to waste lots of money then stick out their hands for more from government.

Strategically it makes a lot of sense for political parties to run strong local government campaigns. The strategic stupidity of the National Party means that they are not doing anything at these local body elections. The Board has not got involved at all, and caucus also put it in the too hard basket just last Tuesday despite the impassioned plea from Auckland based MPs.

This means National’s proxies, C&R in Auckland, and Independent Citizens in Christchurch are going to get no support from National, and will get a sound hiding from Labour in the coming elections.  Read more »

David Farrar blogs about reports the Conservatives are thinking of campaigning in Epsom:

Actually I would say Epsom is more liberal than other electorates such as Tamaki.

My belief is that Paul Goldsmith will become MP for Epsom at the next election, so long as his name is on the ballot paper. I don’t think Epsom wants to become the tactical voting capital of NZ.

If I was advising the Conservatives, I’d tell them to look for a seat where it is likely a National MP will retire in 2014. Their chances are best there.

Farrar is always good at analysis, and will tell you that winning a seat from an incumbent is near impossible. This means Colin Craig will struggle to beat the extremely popular local MP Mark Mitchell in Rodney, who already pasted him once, or the high profile and high name recognition Maggie Barry in North Shore.

This leaves just one seat north of the harbour bridge, East Coast Bays. For some time now it has been rumoured that Murray McCully has been offered three years practicing diplomacy in gay Paris, where he can pretend to be ambassador while examining the cultural implications of the Folies Bergere from the New Zealand taxpayers perspective.

The rough & tumble of Parliament took on a whole new meaning for Paul Goldsmith last night…

MP ‘CARRIED AWAY’ DURING SPEECH
National’s Paul Goldsmith is best known for “taking a fall” in Epsom, allowing ACT’s John Banks to win the seat.
Yesterday he narrowly avoided a replay. In mid-speech on Greens co-leader Russel Norman’s foreign investment bill, the earnest Mr Goldsmith suddenly exited stage right into the aisle beside his seat.
Returning to shot on Parliament’s TV feed, he apologised for “getting carried away”, but Deputy Speaker Lindsay Tisch soon ruled him out of time, saying he should not have “fallen off his perch”.

John Armstrong talks about Mark Mitchell being asked to take a dive to let Colin Craig win Rodney to give National a life line. The precedent is when Don Brash endorsed Rodney Hide in Epsom, at the expense of Richard Worth, and Paul Goldsmith was told not to campaign in Epsom in exchange for a safe list position.

The difference between Worth, Goldsmith and Mitchell is Mitchell has a safe blue seat, he has a 20 year career ahead of him, and like most National back benchers it is in his best interests to see National go into opposition so he can get a promotion when all the senior people leave.

Richard Worth was dependent on Don Brash for a job after 2005 so he toed the line. Paul Goldsmith does what he is told and knew what he was getting into when he ran for Epsom. Paul has admirable ideological perspectives but this does not necessarily translate to vote winning. Mark Mitchell, on the other hand, has huge vote winning potential, a strong electorate infrastructure who are now all behind him, and a bright future that becomes only brighter if National loses in 2014.

It is hard to see Mark Mitchell take a dive. A guy who has a track record like Mark likes a scrap, and won’t shy away from one no matter who it is with. Peter Goodfellow is scarcely going to have him quivering in his boots. Mark is used to facing really scary people like armed offenders as a police officer and a whole lot of seriously bad, heavily armed arabs in the middle east, hell bent on killing him.

Really stern words from Peter Goodfellow or Greg Hamilton will likely be met with a polite “Get Fucked”. Far better that National looks to throw McCully under the bus if they really want Colin Craig holding them to ransom.

Yesterday I blogged about Paul Goldsmith using the title Mp for Epsom, when this is demonstrably incorrect.

A few little tweaks later and all is fixed…or is it? …seems the meta tags haven’t been changed yet.

Although it’s second nature for Goldsmith to be rude to the paid help, he clearly hasn’t jumped up and down enough about how his website still describes himself as the MP for Epsom.

I guess it’s hard to be on top of things sometimes, like following Parliamentary rules properly and not risking complaints to the speaker’s office about misleading constituents.

Interesting that Paul Goldsmith is describing himself as the MP for Epsom, which is of course incorrect. The Hon. John Banks is the MP for Epsom.

He is a scum List MP who lives in Epsom – a completely different kettle of fish.

Not sure the speaker would agree with Goldsmith’s describing himself as such….perhaps the Member for Meerkats would be more accurate?

Stephen Conroy is in trouble for stating the obvious:

The minister in charge of Australia’s broadcasting standards has dropped the F-word live on national television during children’s viewing hours.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy was answering an AAP question about the risk for investment in Australia at the National Press Club in Canberra that was being shown live on the ABC today.

“In terms of sovereign risk, I love the debate about sovereign risk,” he said.

“I have seen a new definition of sovereign risk, it is asymmetrical.

“If a tax goes up, God, that is sovereign risk. But if a tax goes down, f—ing fantastic.”

He quickly added: “Excuse me.”

The next program on the ABC’s schedule was the G-rated Meerkat Manor, an animal show popular with young children.

Bonus points for using the word asymmetrical too.

I’m wondering though, is Meerkat Manor a programme about Paul Goldsmith and Scott Simpson?

Here’s a good question for Epsom voters.

Would Paul Goldsmith be capable of delivering in an entire political career half as much as Banksie was able to deliver in one week in a confidence and supply agreement?

Say what you like about strategic voting, it’s working for the voters of Epsom.

Epsom is following the pattern of the last two elections. We have the media and their left wing hangers on all predicting the demise of the ACT party. Yet the pattern is the same with the polls in Epsom closing.

3 News and NBR have released a poll that shows that John Banks has closed the gap to just 6 points.

A poll of 500 voters in tomorrow’s National Business Review shows:

• National’s Paul Goldsmith still in the lead with 46 percent
• Banks is trailing on 37 percent
• Labour’s David Parker is well back on 12 percent
• While David Hay of the Greens is on 3.3 percent

It is clear that Labour and the Greens have done a dirty deal to encourafge their voters to vote for Paul Goldsmith. This is cunning long term thinking, something which National has shown a distinct lack of. If the Greens and Labour planners get their way and maniupulate voters of Epsom into electing Paul Goldsmith and National voters follow along with Trevor Mallard’s strategy then National’s only coalition partner truly of the right will be killed off.

This make the situation in this election very parlous indeed where National, the most popular party by a long way at more than double Labour could effectively be shut out of government. Worse still, even if National does scrape over the line then 2014 becomes almost impossible as Nationals support partners will have disappeared courtesy of Trevor Mallard’s dirty little plan.

National voters in Epsom would forever be remembered as the ones who fell for Labour’s trap. They need to go into the polling booth on Saturday and with a quick stroke of the pen vote for John Banks and National for their party vote. It only takes 4% to change over and national gets a proper coalition partner.

Do Epsom voters really want Russel Norman and the Greens propping up National?

This will allow National to have some comfort and a couple fo extra MPs. It will also allow John Banks and the “Killer Bees” to rebuild the party for the future.

Two polls tonight, similar results.

One News Colmar Brunton Poll:

• National 50.0% (-3.0%)
• Labour 28.0% (+2.0%)
• Green 10.0% (-3.0%)
• ACT 1.7% (+0.1%)
• Maori 2.0% (+0.4%)
• United Future 0.1% (-0.2%)
• Mana 1.0% (-0.3%)
• NZ First 4.2% (+2.0%)
• Conservative 2.4% (+1.0%)

3News Reid Research Poll:

• National 50.8% (+0.8)
• Labour 26.0% (-1.4%)
• Green 13.4% (+0.4%)
• ACT 1.0%
• Maori 1.5%
• United Future 0.0%
• Mana 1.1%
• NZ First 3.1%
• Conservative 1.8%

3News records Labour’s lowest ever result since the 1990′s. Winston Peters looks down and out. On both of these polls, plus the Fairfax poll yesterday, National can govern alone but only just.

This makes it very important that National voter in Epsom votes for John Banks with their electorate vote. ACT are polling high enought to bring at elast another MP in and therefore shore up the centre right. They shouldn;t fall for the wishes of Labour and the Greens who are voting for Paul Goldsmith in order to kill of National’s only real coalition partner.

Voting for Paul Goldsmith in Epsom is voting for a Phil Goff government, with Winston Peters, Hone Harawira and the Greens all adding their billions of spending onto Labour debt laden election promises.

National’s voters need to turn out and party vote National. The election is close and this too makes a mockery of MMP where NZ most popular Prime Minister since records began and a party that commands around 50% of the vote can be tipped from power by a bunch of also rans who barely command 5% or in the case of the Greens under 15% and Labour under a quarter of votes.

You could well end up with a government that is run by someone with just barely 25% of the vote. This is why MMP must be dumped. Vote for Change in the referendum, dump MMP and vote for SM. Let’s stop the ridiculous situation where the Winston peters and Hone harawiras of this world command so much more power than they really deserve.