Greens make MMP history
The Green Party is the first minor party under MMP to survive Government and win 5 per cent of the vote again. Thomas was at the celebrations.
It’s a coming of age moment for the Greens and even (at a stretch) a significant coming of age moment for the MMP system. No minor party has survived a stint in Government and lived to cross the 5 per cent threshold.
With the party looking at 8 per cent of the vote when the Sunday Star-Times went to print, it looks certain to re-enter Parliament, possibly bringing as many as 11 MPs with it.
Elated supporters gathered at Auckland’s viaduct to celebrate the victory, although it may be bittersweet. With Labour set to win an outright majority, the Greens may find it has missed out on a shot of spending another term in government.
Co-leader Marama Davidson said she was ‘‘ beyond thrilled’’ with the result.
‘ We did it!,’’ she yelled to the packed crowd.
Parties have survived in Parliament after government – NZ First, the Ma¯ori Party, United
Future and ACT limped on by holding individual electorates, but the Greens are the first minor party to survive a stint in Government with most of its national vote intact.
Just what share of the vote is uncertain. The party usually performs quite well in special votes thanks to strong support among overseas voters, so its tally on election night will likely grow.
That the Greens have managed to climb this mountain is historic for MMP. After 24 years with the voting system, it appears that a minor party has established a permanent presence for itself on the electoral landscape. The resuscitation of the ACT party to something more than a one-man-band portends well for this too.
It’s an impressive feat given where the party started just a few months ago. Greens co- leader James Shaw’s decision to invest $11.7 million in a private school in Taranaki, against Green Party policy, saw the three parties of
Government briefing publicly and privately against each other, to the detriment of the Greens.
The saga didn’t crash the party’s polling, but it didn’t help. A corporate poll in early September showed the Greens heading for oblivion on 3.2 per cent. The party knew it would be tough, and had one of its star MPs, Chlo¨e Swarbick, fight a brutal campaign for the Auckland Central electorate as an insurance policy.
Despite early polls showing Swarbrick trailing in the seat, she was on track to win an upset victory.
The Greens realised early on that one of the strongest assets to the record it was campaigning on didn’t even belong to its party. That was, of course, Labour leader Jacinda Ardern.
Former Green staffer David Cormack said the strategy had worked.
‘‘ Historically we’ve seen in MMP smaller parties try to distance themselves from the bigger parties and everyone trots out the cliche that no party has polled 5 per cent after government – maybe kudos to the Greens for figuring that out. Particularly when people are so enamoured by [Ardern] and the Covid response it makes sense to hug that.’’
Shaw and Davidson praised Ardern and sold themselves as the party that would make Ardern more like the leader that the New Zealand left wanted her to be.
But that proximity took a turn for the worse in the last week when National leader Judith Collins made the Greens’ wealth tax the centre of her final campaign.
As Collins pointed out, if the Greens made the tax a bottom line for forming a government, it would put Ardern in an impossible position: implement the tax or go back to the polls.
It drove a wedge between the Greens and Labour too. The Greens, looking to soak up as much votes as possible from the left of Labour, suddenly looked more powerful than it had done all term, emboldened that at least some people believed it credible the minor government partner would be setting revenue policy.
It was all very different to the cosy relationship that existed between the two parties in opposition, when they campaigned together under a memorandum of understanding.
Nevertheless it worked; Greens found its 5 per cent.
The real challenge begins with the formation of government. If the Greens form part of a coalition, feelings are bound to get hurt. It’s unclear where the balance of power will lie.
With Winston Peters gone, the Greens have some licence to pull the ‘‘tail-wags-dog’’ card that’s the privilege of minor MMP parties. But just how much the party wants to do that is uncertain. Being a left-wing party, it doesn’t have Peters’ leverage of the centre and it’s not their style.
Cormack said both Labour and the Greens could miss having NZ First as a scapegoat.
‘‘ Both parties have lost their easy excuse, they will both have to justify why they are not going left.’’ the