Election 2020: the Green Party takes back the pieces after a damaging week caused by the ‘mess’ of the Green School

Marama Davidson was furious.

The Green Party co-leader sat in her seat in Parliament for possibly the last time, yelling invective at Nicola Willis, the equally outraged National education spokeswoman.

Willis was giving one of the last speeches in the latest revived Parliament debate, and he was sparking the scandal of the day: the decision by Green Party co-leader James Shaw to push for $ 11.7 million in funding for the private Green School as part of the Government’s construction program.

The national deputy spoke about two public schools she had visited and her deep and understandable concern about the funds allocated to private schools, when they themselves had infrastructure problems. Davidson shouted that Kiwis would be “smart enough to remember that National destroyed their public education.”

READ MORE:
* The dangers of having a political conscience
* James Shaw apologizes for the school’s decision and says he would not do it again.
* James Shaw calls a meeting with Green members to explain the private school funding decision

The anger at the National Party was visceral, different from Davidson’s usual gloss, because of what she saw as outright hypocrisy: The national government spent far less than it did on public schools and supported the creation of charter schools.

But Willis is far from the only person angered by Shaw’s decision, which goes against a long-standing policy of the Greens to oppose private schools. The decision, and the messy week of media stories that followed, comes at a precarious time for the Green Party, which is approaching the 5 percent threshold in most polls, meaning a slightly higher vote. low could get him out of Parliament.

‘It’s ammunition’

“It’s bullshit. And it’s really avoidable from our point of view, ”said Justine Sachs, a left-wing Green Party member and union organizer.

Sachs said the issue seemed to have had a wide reach among the public, “more than likely anything the Green Party has done this year.”

“I was talking to a tenant in public housing and she brought up out of nowhere that she is really upset that this money is going to a private school in Taranaki. These are the kind of working-class people and union members that the Green Party has been trying to build a relationship with. “

Sachs said this was frustrating because the Green Party had done sustained work to win over these voters, who traditionally back Labor, even with a very strong industrial relations policy.

She thanked Shaw’s apologies to the members, but remained angry.

“It’s ammunition. And it comes at a really precarious moment for the party and I think it was avoidable ”.

The Green Party head office is understood to be more optimistic about it, having seen no appreciable drop in support or donations since the story broke.

Maungakiekie Green Party candidate Ricardo Menéndez March said the issue had “detracted” from recent policy announcements, but was not making a big splash in the election campaign, and when it did, he was able to persuade those who were concerned about it. .

“People care deeply about public education, but they know that the Green Party is not just one person,” Menéndez March said.

“But people want to have a conversation about our commitment to public education, which is absolutely fair.”

“Our policy platform goes beyond the decisions that were made at the ministerial and cabinet levels.”

Ministers v party

The disconnect between Green Party ministers and members has been a sore point for the party throughout the period. Davidson led his successful co-leadership campaign against Julie Anne Genter with an explicit promise to be a voice for the caucus members, away from the dirty world of coalition government.

Shaw has received much criticism from his left, although members have continued to re-elect him as co-leader at the AGM each year, placing him at number two on this election’s party list.

“James [Shaw] he’s always had that part of the Green Party that thinks he’s a conservative in green, that deep suspicion of him, ”said David Cormack, a former communications director for the Greens who now works as a left-wing lobbyist and commentator.

“A lot of them will have been waiting for me to slip to jump.”

The prospect of Shaw losing his job over the issue has gripped the political right, with lighthearted tweets encouraging members to leave Shaw on the matter, clearly implying that losing him at this point would also mean losing the election. National leader Judith Collins has also asked Shaw to resign over the issue.

But Sachs, who clearly belongs to the part of the party that supports Davidson over Shaw, said there was no real appetite to ditch him before the election.

“That would only cause more damage to the party. We have to put up a unified front to do our best to get over the line, ”Sachs said.

One longtime member who did not want to be named said it was actually quite ironic because Shaw had been doing something that members had been asking for: doing everything he could to make sure less government money went to carbon intensive projects like roads.

“He’s doing what the members wanted, after the big confusion with the New Zealand update [the pre-Covid-19 $12b stimulus package, which was very roads-focused] – we don’t want carbon intensive finance. “

“It just failed spectacularly.”

THE STORY GOES ON AND ON

Stuff broke the news of the expense on Wednesday, August 26. More than a week later it remains in the headlines, partially helped by the fact that Shaw took until Tuesday to publicly apologize, following a private apology to members on Friday night.

The longtime member was angry that the party had not acted faster to get ahead of history, rather than letting it drag on as long as the Metiria Turei saga had in the last election.

“The last week has been a f …… disaster. We should have learned from 2017 how to do crisis communications. Every day there seems to be a new story, a new angle. Not everything has been as straightforward as it could have been, ”said the member.

“James has now done his best. There is a much more scandalous use of money in the last year by other government parties. “

The member was unhappy with the leak of the membership call to RNZ. on Thursday, which seemed intended to question the position of the Labor Party, but also led to the story lingering in the media for another day.

“For the love of God, can we move on with this ridiculous story?”

Sachs said the potential green voter he had spoken to on the matter seemed to be attached to Labor now, which was a shame because Labor was not embracing left-wing issues like a wealth tax and a more expansive welfare system. while the Green Party The party went.

“It’s a real missed opportunity to focus that super environmentalism on something that could be really popular.

“There is room to the left,” Sachs said, noting that polls show that a sizeable portion of the public would support higher taxes to pay for a broader welfare system.

The Greens have had polls three times higher than now in the last decade, but it was always when the Labor Party was weak. Analysis from 2017 has suggested that a large part of the increase in the Labor vote came at the expense of Green Party voters. Those who were still in the party did not seem to be that easy to walk away from the party: the party vote has not moved much during this period.

Cormack said the Greens “remained the party with far more integrity than anyone else in the House” and suspected that many of those core supporters “would stay on their side even when they are in defeat.”

“If private education is your decision, then there is no other party for you.”

Ironically, the distant election date that the Greens fought would probably help.

“They still have a month left. Todd Muller, what, two months ago? People have forgotten about that. People tend to forget about these political scandals. “