Little’s chief going north

Labour leader Andrew Little’s chief of staff Matt McCarten is poised to quit the job and head up a new Labour office in Auckland.

Little said he had not finalised who would staff the Auckland office, though he had been looking at setting it up for some time.

But the move there by McCarten was ‘‘voluntary, willingly and with agreement, not in high dudgeon’’.

Asked if he had anyone in line to take over as his chief of staff, after McCarten shifted north, Little said: ‘‘That’s part of the detail that is to be finalised’’.

McCarten was a surprise appointment to the job in February 2014 when David Cunliffe was Labour leader and stayed on with Little when he took over. He had previously headed the Unite union and was a key player in former deputy prime minister Jim Anderton’s Alliance - before an acrimonious bust-up with Anderton.

He said at the time he took the job that his health was good and he had ‘‘the all clear’’ from cancer. He had been diagnosed with what he was told was terminal cancer six years ago and at one stage thought he had only a few months to live.

McCarten did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.

A move to Auckland will leave Little searching for both a new chief of staff and a new chief press secretary after Sarah Stuart quit the latter role in May. - Vernon Small