Luxon won’t have easy ride
Christopher Luxon’s coronation as National’s bright new hope is no longer so sure. It emerged on Tuesday that sitting National MP Agnes Loheni has also put her hand up for the National Party candidacy in the Botany electorate.
Parking company boss Jake Bezzanti is also understood to have entered the race.
Botany is traditionally a safe seat for the National Party, meaning the real competition is for who wins the party nomination – not the race itself.
Several National sources spoke to suggested Luxon would not have a clean coronation ahead of him.
Loheni may have less profile than Luxon but it is understood she has been putting in work around the electorate already. She is also National’s associate spokeswoman for small business, which will do well to differentiate her from one of New Zealand’s most high-flying chief executives, setting up a real battle between Queen Street and Main Street.
Loheni, who declined to comment for this article, has the natural credibility that comes from already being an MP – albeit a recent one, brought into Parliament on the list after Chris Finlayson’s retirement.
Her main claim to fame in Parliament however is her Catholic– informed social conservatism, showcased in her maiden speech and strident opposition to abortion legislation.
Luxon himself is an Evangelical Christian and refused to answer when asked about his views on abortion but his experience running an outwardly socially progressive company will have definitely left a mark on him.
It is unclear whether this social conservatism will help or harm Loheni with the wider electorate.
Neighbouring Pakuranga has elected Simeon Brown, one of the most socially conservative MPs in National.
But Botany is only slightly more religious than the rest of the country.
It could well help the party delegates who will be making the selection process however, as they tend to be older and a lot more conservative than the general voting population.
Why try for an electorate?
Electorate seats – particularly safe ones like Botany – are white gold in the National Party. They typically represent a job for life if you can do the job well, and the party itself has a natural distrust of list MPs. After all, no prime minister has ever been elected as a list MP.
Former National Party president Michelle Boag suggested Luxon chose to run in a competitive electorate because it would be hard.
‘‘He could have taken the easy route like [former leader] Don Brash and just stood on the list. The fact that he chose not to and chose a difficult electorate is him saying to the delegates: I’m up for this fight. I’m going to go out there and win this.’’
Boag suggested the party would reward Luxon if he defeated the current Botany MP – former National whip Jami-Lee Ross, who resigned from the party in a storm of controversy.
‘‘Ross will be a very active presence in the electorate. He no longer has any credibility in my view with National voters. But given the behaviour we have seen from him before, he won’t make for an easy challenge.’’
Boag has been rumoured to be advising Luxon on his entry into politics but denied this when asked by Stuff.
Ross declined to comment.
As for Loheni, an electorate seat is a whole lot more safe than her current list placing of 49.
How selection works
Despite Luxon seeming to have support with the party’s higher-ups, the party executive have much less power over his selection than you might think.
Just ask Boag, who parachuted a then-unknown banker named John Key into the safe Helensville seat back in 2002. She managed it but it was somewhat bloody – and he didn’t have anywhere near the profile Luxon does.
‘‘The important thing to understand about the National Party selections is it is a totally democratic process that is very much driven by the local electorate,’’ Boag said.
Attempts to bring in high-profile candidates have failed in the past – including in Botany itself, when Maggie Barry lost her selection race to Jami-Lee Ross in 2011.
More famously All Black captain and Rhodes scholar David Kirk lost his selection race for Tamaki in 1992. Here is how it works. Nominations are open to any duespaying National Party member who has been a member for the past year.
If there are fewer than 200 financial members in the electorate, then the National Party board gets a lot of power at this point but if there is more – and there is said to be about
600 in Botany – a group of 60 delegates selected primarily from the electorate are tasked with voting for the eventual nominee.
But before that voting occurs, the party executive do have a chance to weed out problematic candidates in ‘‘pre-selection’’ – whittling the list down to five potential candidates.
There are then at least three ‘‘meet-the-candidate’’ style meetings for the delegates, including one where party leader Simon Bridges and party president Peter Goodfellow will ask a question of the candidates.
But behind the scenes, the candidates are generally doing all they can to secure the votes of those
60 delegates. One former National candidate described it as ‘‘intensive speed dating’’ while another noted so much tea was drunk it often became a long mission to find bathrooms.
To become the successful nominee, a candidate must win a majority – 31 – of the delegate votes.
If no candidate manages that, the person with the least votes is knocked out and another round of voting takes place.
It is quite normal for several rounds of voting to be necessary.
Bridges told National was a party that ‘‘liked a competition’’.
‘‘The selection process is gruelling. You have at least 60 people really put you through your paces, who want to understand every aspect of your life and character, and what you bring to Parliament.’’
Loheni told the caucus on Tuesday of her decision to run but Bridges said she let some other MPs know ahead of time. He said he expected his caucus in general to refrain from influencing the race in any way.