Friday 2 September 2016

Labour vs The People's Party: Mt Roskill Up For Grabs?

The Successor: The man the Labour Party has chosen to replace Goff is young, intelligent, hard-working, and has already proved his ability to attract the votes of his neighbours by being twice elected to his local community board. As Goff’s electorate chair, he worked tirelessly to keep the Mt Roskill seat in his party’s hands. But, this otherwise ideal candidate does have one important factor working against him – his ethnicity. Michael Wood is a Pakeha New Zealander.
 
LESS THAN TWO-MINUTES’ WALK from my front doorstep is a wine shop. On Saturday, 13 August, it was robbed by four masked teenagers wielding clubs. The two retail workers on duty were beaten badly enough to require treatment in hospital. It was not an isolated incident. The same business had been robbed three times in as many weeks. The retailer and his staff are Chinese New Zealanders. The wine shop is located in the Mt Roskill electorate.
 
Barring something politically cataclysmic overwhelming his campaign, the current Member of Parliament for Mt Roskill, Phil Goff, will be Auckland City’s next mayor. A by-election will, therefore, be needed to fill the vacancy created by Goff’s departure for the Town Hall.
 
The man the Labour Party has chosen to replace Goff is young, intelligent, hard-working, and has already proved his ability to attract the votes of his neighbours by being twice elected to his local community board. As Goff’s electorate chair, he worked tirelessly to keep the Mt Roskill seat in his party’s hands. But, this otherwise ideal candidate does have one important factor working against him – his ethnicity. Michael Wood is a Pakeha New Zealander.
 
“So is Phil Goff”, you rightfully object, “but it didn’t prevent him from taking 56 percent of the Electorate Vote in the 2014 General Election.” No, it didn’t, but then Goff has held the seat for all but three of the last 35 years. Incumbency and name recognition confer enormous advantages upon a candidate, and Goff has made the most of them in ten out of the last twelve general elections.
 
Unfortunately for Michael Wood, while Goff has been winning, Mt Roskill has been changing. As the local political fiefdom of the long-time Deputy-Mayor of Auckland, Keith Hay, Mt Roskill was a notorious bastion of evangelical Christian social-conservatism. Some Labour wags even referred to it as the “Bible Belt”.  Not anymore. Today, Mt Roskill’s 25,000 Christians share their electorate with more than 3,000 Muslims and nearly 6,000 Hindus. This religious diversity reflects the fact that “Asians” comprise nearly 40 percent of the electorate. More than 45 percent of today’s Mt Roskillites were born overseas.
 
Michael Wood has always known he would face a tough race to secure this new Mt Roskill for Labour. Boundary changes have shaved an uncomfortably large slice off Goff’s winning margin, and, as if that wasn’t bad enough, in 2014 National’s Party Vote tally exceeded Labour’s by more than 2,000 votes. In other words, Mt Roskill should no longer be classed as a safe Labour seat.
 
Even so, by securing his selection early and setting in motion an impressive canvassing effort, Wood has made himself the one to beat.
 
On Monday night, however, the formation of the New Zealand People’s Party changed everything. Aimed squarely at winning the votes of Mt Roskill’s large immigrant community, the People’s Party has the potential to draw enough votes away from Labour to deny Wood the seat. (By-elections are fought under the rules of First-Past-The-Post.) Indeed, if National decided not to field a candidate, and steered its voters towards the People’s Party, the seat might even change hands.
 
Much will depend on the quantum of money and expertise the people behind the People’s Party are willing to invest in contesting the by-election – and what cause they choose to make their own.
 
Which takes us back neatly to the wine shop and the multiple attacks it has sustained. For far too many immigrant families such victimisation has become almost routine. Their anger at the apparent impotence of the authorities grows daily, even as their patience wears thin. A charismatic candidate, chosen from either the Indian or Chinese communities, running on an uncompromising promise to restore law and order to the Streets of Mt Roskill could easily attract thousands of immigrant votes. Add to them the votes cast strategically by National supporters raring to deny Labour the seat, and the race could get very close indeed.
 
Fortunately, that veteran of closely-fought by-election contests, Matt McCarten, has just announced his imminent return to Auckland. Andrew Little’s erstwhile chief-of-staff knows that if Labour doesn’t win Auckland, then it doesn’t win at all. Mt Roskill looks set to provide McCarten with his first organisational test. One can only assume that, for Michael Wood’s campaign team, the Wellington cavalry cannot arrive too soon.
 
This essay was originally published in The Waikato Times, The Taranaki Daily News, The Timaru Herald, The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 2 September 2016.

16 comments:

peteswriteplace said...

A very good and thought provoking post.

Guerilla Surgeon said...

I probably don't know enough about the intimate goings-on of the Labor Party, or for that matter Auckland, but I do know that if anyone promises to inculcate "lawn order" in just one suburb of Auckland they are basically on the same level as Trump. Or for that matter Clinton, promising stuff they can't deliver on. Not that that necessarily stops anyone from being elected. But I do know enough about Matt McCarten to know that he's a very good organiser. I used to live in and around Mount Roskill for some years in my youth. It had more fundamentalist churches than anywhere but Wainuiomata. Without a leavening of Chloe.

Polly said...

It should be a shoo-in for Wood but in addition to the good points you have raised which casts some doubts on an easy ride I wonder about the Labour Party and were they are heading.
We have had for sometime one of the biggest political scandals I haver seen in our country, the housing crises lurches from one scandal to another, from one City to another City. The Government seems impotent to resolution, sad and angry stories emerge daily, the Labour party have almost continual press coverage and have forged cross-party conferences to further their arguments.

The noise from this activity is endless but still Labour languishes in approval 25%-30%. Labour is not getting traction from this noise, Labour seems oblivious to this fact, they seem to have their heads in the sand on their own leadership.

Michael Woods needs to run his own campaign and not use Central office or Matt McCarten, I believe, because of the above, that Goffs 8000 majority could disappear if Labours leaders get anywhere near Michael Woods.

greywarbler said...

I had read of very active community policing in Mt Roskill and their pride in the outcomes that had been achieved. But looking up the area on google it seems that there are growing problems now but that there is no rise in funding for community policing. Local Government NZ has asked for more help with this across NZ.

The funding for Auckland on a per capita basis is lower than other areas which is counter-intuitive. And in this report excerpted below there is reference to the rise in crime paralelling the rise in Auckland population.

From report: 7/7/2016 Regional Strategy and Policy Committee

(When crime involving Maori is being discussed the emphasis tends to be on them as perpetrators. But as victims they are worse afflicted than average.)
27. Māori are disproportionately represented as victims of crime. While Māori make up 15 per cent of New Zealand’s total population, 47 per cent of Māori have been victims of crime. This compares to 37 per cent of New Zealand Europeans.
(I did not see reference to other ethnicities but don't have time to read the whole. But google has news items on unsatisfactory treatment of Africans and it seems that there is a dual approach, with some police adopting crude policing and harsh methods while there is another group working in a community model with restraint and respect.)

Earlier in the report:

14 According to Parliamentary debates the number of General Duty Constables or authorised officers has decreased by 18 per cent since 2009.[1] The Police Association has also argued that reductions in non-constabulary staff have placed additional workload pressures on sworn officers.

15. There is a positive correlation between population size and the need for police officers.[2] Frontline staff in particular play a central role in ensuring community safety.

16. In 2014/15 there were 8,907 sworn or authorised officers in New Zealand. This equates to one sworn officer for approximately 515 people. The ratio of police to population is low in comparison to other jurisdictions.
· In 2014, the ratio in Australia was around 1:340. Further, in Queensland, which has a similar population size and urban/rural split to New Zealand, the ratio was around 1:333.[3]
· In 2014, the ratio in England and Wales was 1:431.

17. While Police received additional funding of $299.2 million as part of Budget 2016, no additional funding was allocated to community policing or increasing police numbers. Government investment was allocated as follows:...
http://infocouncil.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/Open/2016/07/REG_20160707_AGN_6374_AT.htm

jh said...

I think the migrants might blame Labour for the robberies as Labour has a legacy (feminism and welfarism and eye of newt (gallblader of Toad). I recall Shaun Tan splitting with the Greens over their reactions to those sort of assaults.

jh said...

"The biggest issue with our people is law and order," he says. "It's a big issue and nobody is really standing for them. Then suddenly somebody gets killed then everybody comes in, the Prime Minister says this statement or MPs make this statement, then nothing happens afterwards."

The constitution also has a clear focus on immigration, stating it wants to develop immigration policies to allow international students, migrants and refugees to settle sooner into a comfortable life in New Zealand and crack down on crime, including assaults and exploitation of students.
http://www.newshub.co.nz/politics/nzs-first-political-party-dedicated-to-immigrants-2016082919

I know a Chinese migrant who left Christchurch for Auckland as Christchurch was too quiet for him. It's only fair we let NZ look more familiar to them?

jh said...

What do you think of Dame Devoys call for people to come forward with their stories of racism Chris? She is taking sides against those who do want (and didn't want) to live in a fast tracked multicultural society. Once that would have been called treachery; but who are these people we have lauding over us? They who have "the infrastructure" are being undermined by social media
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/09/02/muslims-dont-tolerate-multiculturalism/

Bushbaptist said...

breitbart?? That site is so rightwing white supemacist, it is off the planet!

Bannon, the recent chief editor, has stated so many times. Bannon is now on Trumpy's team.

Guerilla Surgeon said...

http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/09/02/muslims-dont-tolerate-multiculturalism/

Wow - for someone who was supposedly left-wing you certainly pick some great places to gather information. Breitbart, that model of rigorous investigation and fair and balanced reporting. You realise that they actually make shit up right? And have been successfully sued for it.

jh said...

He is quoted from a Dutch magazine.
http://www.elsevier.nl/nederland/blog/2016/09/minderheden-helpen-multiculturele-idealen-zelf-om-zeep-352112/

If we relied on our MSM where would we get? Take today's Q & A's discussion panel on the Woodhouse interview: Raymond Millar (who sees N Z First as Voldemort), a Muslim mamma and Michael Barnet of non-tradeables.

jh said...

Bushbaptist said...

breitbart?? That site is so rightwing white supemacist, it is off the planet!
.....
white supremacist is negative affective language. The context Brietbart operates in is the rights of a population to choose who they let in to their country on what terms, what rate and the supposed benefits to the population of the [shrinking pool of prime] destination countr(ies)y.
People have strong identities based on a common heritage and culture and that cuts both ways. Missing also from the Race Relations office is any appreciation of human behaviour from an evolutionary perspective; it is old school Marxist.
I'm reading a book called White Gold about the thousands of white slaves who were captured by corsairs. Moulay Ismail used specially selected black slave drivers. Somehow this doesn't fit the bad us narrative which looks no further than western imperialism.

jh said...

The party of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), has suffered a major setback losing several percentage points since the last election in 2011 heading down to third place.

While the Socialists are in a commanding lead with 30 per cent of the vote, the party lost much support from its traditional working class base. Both the AfD and the Socialists took 28 per cent of the working vote due to many working people being directly impacted by the effects of mass migration.
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/09/04/afd-party-election-merkels-home-state/

whereas the labour party has a legacy of people who are determined not to see what is going on.

Guerilla Surgeon said...

"If we relied on our MSM where would we get? "

Well, fewer outright lies. Although perhaps not so much opinion that agrees with yours.

Guerilla Surgeon said...

Breitbart, used to be nutty but libertarian. Now it's just nutty. And as I said, they actually formulate lies to suit their racist agenda. They are in fact too racist even for mainstream conservatives. And it might be negative effective language, but it's accurate language at the same time. They attend fascist rallies, they mix with people who have committed hate crimes, and they are mad as fucking loons. My big problem with them of courses that they make shit up. :) But you seem to just click on any random site that supports your weird views and think that it's fine. You seem to be on the verge of accepting their racist philosophy yourself if you haven't already.

jh said...

Criticisms of the BBC
In 2010 it was reported by the Journalism.co.uk website, after a Freedom of Information request, that the BBC had spent £270,867.12 in legal fees since 2005 in sustaining its refusal of the request to publicly release the Balen Report.[101][102]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_BBC#The_Balen_Report

jh said...

"Reasoning was not designed to pursue the truth. Reasoning was designed by evolution to help us win arguments. "
https://www.edge.org/conversation/hugo_mercier-the-argumentative-theory