Te Atatu

Election Results has a piece on Te Atatu which makes for interesting reading. Certainly more interesting than Bombers mad rantings at Tumeke on a similar subject.

Carter may yet decide to run as an independent or for another party and a stock on this issue is currently rating this as an 11 percent chance.

It is unlikely Carter could win the seat, but despite his reputation in some circles for arrogance he was a hard working local MP who could hurt Labour’s chances if he felt like doing so.

Carter won the seat with a majority of 5289 over National’s Tau Henare, but National in fact won a greater share of the party vote by 13,183 to 13,171.

Henare is standing again for National against Labour’s Phil Twyford, though the iPredict market does not rate his chance highly.

Henare has been working hard in the seat for some years and Twyford is a relative newcomer to the area as his hunt for an electorate to call his own finally came to an end.

Another possible wild card is a third serious candidate throwing their hand in the ring.

Te Atatu is the one of many seats Winston Peters is rumoured to be considering standing in.

If this is the case and he does stand a chance then the other candidate winning the seat stock for Te Atatu could be considered to be seriously under priced, though even if Peters does stand it would seem extremely unlikely he could take it.

One thing the article doesn’t take into account is the utter collapse of Labour’s committee and organisation structure since the controversial selection of Phil Twyford. National seems to be under-priced in Te Atatu according to all this.

Even by Labour’s low standards standards Phil Twyford is a loser. Around Auckland at candidate selection time the strategy at electorate after electorate was “anyone but Twyford”.

It’s not hard to see why.

Yesterday Twyford posted on Red Alert 5 written Parliamentary Questions to the Prime Minister and 6 to Rodney Hide.

These are the winning questions from Labour designed to unsettle National and dislodge them from Government come November. These are clearly part of the Stealing Underpants election campaign strategy brilliantly thought up by Trevor Mallard.

Clearly Phil Twyford is wondering what on earth was Rodney Hide doing skulking over in Te Atatu taking pictures of Twyford’s and Henare’s offices that are dead opposite each other in Te Atatu Road and using VIP Services. I mean the cheek of it travelling down a main road in a Labour…oops…I mean Chris Carter’s electorate.

To save taxpayer money on the Parliamentary Questions I risked life and limb and rang Hide.  He abused me some more for being a dirty coup plotter.  And when he had calmed down said he had been with Labour’s Kelvin Davis and Carmel Sepuloni opening the new Arohanui Satellite Class at Edmonton School plum in the middle of the Te Atatu electorate.  Tau Henare couldn’t make it but sent along his electorate agent Alex Sie who was duly acknowledged.

Hide was there as the Minister Responsible for Special Needs.

But where was Twyford?  And how come he didn’t know about the big occasion in a school in his own wanna-be electorate?  And how come Kelvin and Carmel didn’t tell Phil?  And how come Phil is drafting Parliamentary Questions to government ministers to find out what is happening in what he thinks is his own electorate?

I asked Hide why he stopped to take the picture? He said it was because he had never seen anything as absurd as two List MPs’ offices dead opposite each other, and in an electorate of a another MP as well.

From where I am sitting this certainly looks like a Stealing Underpants campaign strategy to me.

The strategy is really working too from the latest polls and some of the tactics are becoming apparent. We’ve had David Shearer endorsing a government policy, Trevor Mallard trying to beat me in an asymmetrical war that he can’t possibly win, Labour trying to hack my website in retaliation for outing their silly information security, and now we have Phil twyford drafting umpteen written questions in order to get an answer that if he had attended a local electorate school opening he would have known the answers to.

Yep the Underpants Stealing plan is working. They must be winning votes with those cunning stunts.

Chris Carter could give the Labour party a very nice Christmas present this year…a by-election.

The Labour Party will be ready to fight a byelection in the West Auckland seat of Te Atatu next year if incumbent MP Chris Carter quits before the end of the parliamentary term.

But at least the party no longer has to worry about standing against Mr Carter in the general election after his preferred successor, Labour MP Phil Twyford, won the party’s nomination over seven others at the weekend.

Party president Andrew Little said he was not planning for a byelection, but it was a possibility.

“If that happens, we’ll be ready for it.”

He described the party coffers as “very healthy”.

Good oh…then the perfect revenge for Chris Carter would be to force a by-election, have Labour expend some of that cash and even better send Judith Tizard to parliament for 8 months. It is certainly a Christmas present I’d love to see happen.

Phil Twyford, Labour’s former spokesman for the homeless, now has a home. He has been selected as Labour’s candidate fot Te Atatu.

Now we wait and see if Chris Carter gets a better job offer s his finishes of his book.

A by-election in Te Atatu triggers the “Tizard Effect”.

Labour faces a dilemma today. They have to select a replacement for Chris Carter in Te Atatu and they have to also run the risk of triggering the “Tizard Effect”.

Chris Carter has said he will trigger a by-election if anyone other than Labour’s spokeman for the homeless, Phil Twyford, gets the nomination, but he also lets Labour know that even if they elect Twyford that the Tizard effect is in play still.

Mr Carter said he did not know what his political future held and he might leave politics before the election if a good job came along – forcing an unwelcome byelection for Labour.

So Chris Carter is saying that if a better job comes along than sitting in parliament in the naughty chair then he will be off and force a by-election. If Phil Twyford wins that by-election then Judith Tizard will make a triumphant return to parliament.

Actually there are a couple of scenarios for the Tizard Effect to kick in. Apart from Twyford, Rajen Prasad is also seeking the nomination and Chris Carter will resign and force a by-election if he gets selected.

If somehow a by-election in Te Atatu isn’t held we still have an exciting prospect to look forward to.

Mr Carter is writing a book about the previous Labour Government, which he hopes to finish by March.

Oh I can’t wait.

Someone should really write a Wikipedia entry called The Tizard Effect. It looks like it is seriously in play at the moment.

Labour sources tell me that Chris Carter and their electorate chair have told Labour that if they select Phil Twyford in Te Atatu then Carter will resign immediately and force a by-election on them. Labour are very,v ery tempted by this offer/threat.

David Farrar blogged about this possibility just a short while ago and it looks like it is gaining traction.

The dilemma for Labour is “The Tizard Effect”.

They really, really, want shot of Chris Carter, the longer he stays in parliament the more stupid they look. They also want to give Phil Twyford a home, a seat that he has longed for but just can’t seem to get selected for. Twyford right now looks like a big loser. He can’t convinve any electorate he stands for to select him, his cries about the hijacking of Auckland look very hollow now that Len Brown is safely esconsed in the Town Hall, so to gain a selection woukld patch up that particular wound for Labour and for Twyford.

The only problem as I have said is The Tizard Effect. If there is a by-election and Phil Twyford wins then the next person on the list, just in time for election year, would be Judith Tizard. The Labour caucus wants her back like they want cancer, but on the flip side they’d like to be shot of Carter.

You could say they are on the horns of a dilemma. And that dilemma is called Judith Tizard.

Chris Carter has been given the arse from Labour.

Labour leader Phil Goff says he has nothing to hide after disgraced MP Chris Carter threatened to expose the secrets of his former colleagues in an attempt to save his tattered political reputation.

“What he does is up to him. I have no skeletons in my closet. I’m not particularly worried about it,” Mr Goff said.

Labour Party president Andrew Little revealed today that Mr Carter had threatened to disclose the private information of other Labour MPs if expelled from the party.

Mr Carter, the MP for Te Atatu, was expelled by Labour’s national council after a lengthy hearing last night.

During the meeting Mr Carter threatened to disclose private information about unnamed Labour MPs if he was expelled, Mr Little said.

”He just said he had a lot of information on a lot of individuals in the caucus and that he wouldn’t hesitate to disclose that if it suited him to do so,” Mr Little said.

”That threat was clear, but we couldn’t be persuaded by that threat. It’s not a very persuasive argument.”

Mr Goff said Chris Carter was a sideshow and the party had moved on.

Goff is toughing it out, but let’s see the dirt file.  Are there any, for example, senior Labour MPs who are themselves hiding behind name suppression? That would be a bit hypocritical considering all the public statements about David Garrett.

Phil Goff looks the winner so far but the constant distraction of Carter and now Te Atatu will be whittling away any semblance of strength Phil Goff has, which is precious little.

There is an old adage in marketing, as much as in politics. If you have to start defending your position or product you have already lost.

A frustrated Phil Goff has dropped the s-bomb, telling reporters in Wellington today that questions about the strength of his leadership are “bull shit”.

The Labour leader was fronting after a meeting of the party’s national council to consider steps against the sacked MP Chris Carter today.

The meeting resolved that Carter has a case to answer if he is to remain a member of the Labour Party. Nominations for Carter’s Te Atatu electorate seat have been re-opened and Goff said Carter would, as of Monday, become an independent parliamentary MP.

He has already been dumped from Labour’s parliamentary caucus after a bungled attempt to undermine Goff’s leadership.

Asked this afternoon if the prolonged saga over Carter’s membership reflected on the strength of his leadership, Goff said: “Well that’s bullshit, frankly. That’s just nonsense.” Goff said he thought the question was non-sensical.

“It’s got nothing to do with my leadership. The party must follow due process – is there anything about that that somebody doesn’t understand?” Goff said that Carter would become an independent MP on Monday when notification was sent to the Speaker of Parliament.

Some-one should take Mr Stayin’ Alive aside and explain that even uttering those few sentences has cooked his already well done goose. Labour are so emasculated though that there are precious few with any testicles to do anything about the “Goff problem”.

Meanwhile his fellow Backbone Club member, George Hawkins is planning his exit from one trough and his entry to another. It should be pointed out to those too stupid to understand that George Hawkins 20 year anniversary in parliament arrives on October 28th, he can resign after that and retain his massive golden pension, one of the few still eligible, and trot off to the new trough, with his wallet still safely being filled by the taxpayer.

If iPredict had a stock for a by-election in Manurewa, I’d be investing heavily in that.

Chris Carter is digging in for the long haul, engaging a lawyer and scalping tax-payers for two months leave for his “unwell-ness”.

Labour’s hard-line smear attack on Chris Carter’s sanity has back-fired on them at a hundred miles an hour and all at a time when Helen Clark is in the country. I can just bet that for the time Clark is here her lurking shadow will be Chris Carter.

Once she flies back to he do nothing job in New York her flying companion will most likely be Chris Carter again. All the while Te Atatu remains without an MP.

Through all of this Andrew Little and Phil Goff look like prize twats, left now sitting on their thumbs, spinning. They have painted themselves into a corner, with their own paint and their own brush. They were hoping to get Carter to resign and force taxpayers to stump up $600,000 for a by-election, that plan has failed utterly.

Labour are leaderless in all respects, at the party level and in parliament.

Interesting information is starting to filter out in Auckland too about the challenge on for Manurewa. Unionist Jerome Mika is named as the challenger. Not many outside of Auckland would realise this but Jerome Mika is one of a close bunch of friends of Len Brown. It was also no surprise to see Len Brown at the launch of the ShittyVision campaign the other day. It seems he is keeping his hand in through all aspects of the Labour Party, from local level to candidate selection for electorates.

Chris Carter’s ill-advised memo to repeaters seems to have revealed the extent of the opposition to not only Phil Goff but also to the dry-right of Labour. The unionists and wet-liberal and rainbow sections have had enough it seems. Phil Goff and George Hawkins are old Roger-nomes. Their politics is drier biltong.

While Chris Carter sits on leave doing nothing at the taxpayers expense, Labour is imploding into several nasty factions. I must say it is a pleasure to watch.

Labour leader Phil Goff says ousted MP Chris Carter doesn’t have a mandate to remain as MP for Te Atatu.

Mr Carter was thrown out of the Labour caucus yesterday on a unanimous vote after sending an unsigned letter to media representatives in an attempt to undermine Mr Goff’s leadership.

Spectacular….this is going to be a massive filip for National in the polls. People do not like nasty blood-letting.

As I said yesterday if I was Chris Carter I would resign and force the broke, busted, dis-united Labour Party try and fight me off.

Mr Goff told reporters in Auckland today Mr Carter should reconsider that.

“That decision constitutionally is his, but he was elected as a Labour MP and he no longer has that mandate. He needs to reflect on that,” Mr Goff said.

“I think that he does not have a mandate to be the Member of Parliament for Te Atatu, given the withdrawal of support from the Labour Party.”

This is important here for Goff, at the moment Chris Carter is still a Labour MP. They haven’t thrown him out of the party. Does Phil Goff have the stones to take that step. Until he does then all this talk is simple bluster as the two men stare each other down.

It also looks like Phil Twyford, the hapless Member for the homeless, has been spiked again.

When Labour’s national council meets in a week’s time it is almost certain to suspend Mr Carter’s party membership. A new Te Atatu candidate would then have to be selected for the next election.

Radio New Zealand‘s political staff say it seems likely the party will look outside its caucus for a candidate.

Mr Carter says he’ll stay as on as an independent MP until the next election, but will give his vote to Labour.

This is going to be the toughest part for Labour because the LEC chair is Peter Kaiser. If he stands firm then Labour will have a problem with selections. it is clear though that they intend to strip Chris Carter of his nomination for Te Atatu and to also find a replacement candidate meaning almost certainly he is about to be Taito’d, chucked ignominiously from the Labour party, for speaking the truth.

The most telling for Labour is their utter paranoia of the “Tizard Effect”. Their reticence to talk about a sitting MP taking the nomination shows just how deeply un-popular Judith Tizard is.

For me though I think the most appalling stance taken by Labour is to question Chris Carter’s mental health, and to question it openly. This shows just how caring and sharing the Labour party really is, they are busily trying to spin and knife Chris Carter by now labeling him as mental. Phil Goff doesn’t deserve to be leader if this is to be their strategy to side-line Chris Carter.

Labour is in a real pickle. It is clear from my discussions with some Labour caucus members that Carter is both right and wrong. Let me explain, Chris Carter is right in saying that no-one thinks that Labour can win the next election, with Phil goff or anyone else for that matter, he is wrong though that caucus thinks there is someone else who could do better, there simply isn’t. Not a single name has been proffered to me as a suggested replacement for Phil. The overall feeling seems to be that like him or loathe Phil Goff is the leader only in the absence of anyone else.

One thing about Helen Clark, she ruled caucus with an iron fist, Phil Goff has let this get away on him.