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“Minister Shaw will not sign this report until the Green School in Taranaki is incorporated.”
The email said that Shaw discussed the ultimatum with the Minister of Education.
“Minister Shaw has also discussed this with Minister Hipkins.
“Sorry to be the wrench in the works, but if we can get the project in, he’ll sign everything this afternoon,” the email read.
Shaw said Tuesday he’s sorry.
“The decision I made to support this project was an error in judgment, for which I apologize,” he said. “I apologize to parents, teachers and unions. I apologize to the members of the Green Party who have been working tirelessly in their communities to ensure that the Greens are part of the next government.”
But that’s where sorry may not be enough. Your tireless work could be in vain. Shaw’s change of funds could be the death sentence for the Greens next term.
Newshub asked Marama Davidson, co-leader of the Green Party, if he recognized that he might have jeopardized the Greens’ chances of returning to Parliament.
“It is very clear, it cannot be denied that we were already hovering around 5 percent,” he said.
The Greens were at 5.7 percent in the latest Newshub-Reid investigative poll and need 5 percent to get back into Parliament.
“It’s no secret that we are hovering around the 5 percent threshold,” Shaw said. “So it’s a risk and I understand it.”
When Newshub asked the Prime Minister how concerned she was that the Greens might not return to Parliament, Jacinda Ardern said she “just doesn’t think so.”
The Greens’ other government partner, New Zealand First, was less generous.
“This is Metiria Turei, but three years later and at a much higher cost,” said leader Winston Peters, raising the specter of the former Greens co-leader.
Turei resigned 45 days before the 2017 elections; 46 days to go to Decision 2020.
But Shaw seems confident that he will stay.
“I don’t think this is a resignation-level event,” he said.
Shaw said that if he was making the same decision about funding Green School, he would not support it.
Playing chicken for funding failed and the reaction has been astronomical.
With a deep sigh, he said, “I feel really bad about the way this has played out.”
You could feel a lot worse on the night of October 17.
Analysis by political editor Tova O’Brien
How real is the risk that this will topple the Greens in this election?
Very, both co-leaders have admitted what it really says something. Politicians often have a hard time admitting possible defeat.
There is a strange and uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu here. Like 2017 with Metiria Turei, an epic stumble at the last hurdle before the campaign.
There has been a lot of talk that the Greens have been forced to swallow many dead rats in the Government. This reeks of desperation for last minute profit.
But withholding support for all those other projects just to get Green School funds across the line, jeopardize all of those jobs, and make their ministerial colleagues pay a political ransom … This is by far the ebb. lower than James Shaw, but it is his party who could pay for it.
