Peters bats away talk of Greens
"We're making huge progress.'' NZ First leader Winston Peters
Winston Peters has suggested that if a Government was to be formed with Labour, then the inclusion of the Greens as a headline party would be a ‘‘gross misrepresentation’’.
The NZ First leader was responding to questions over whether it was his understanding that the Green Party would be voting to accept the Labour-NZ First deal, or whether they would simply be voting to approve their deal in separate negotiations with Labour.
It comes from questions over whether the Greens were at the mercy of Labour to fight their corner in dealings with NZ First.
Emerging from his first discussion with National on Wednesday morning, Peters said good progress was being made.
‘‘We’re making huge progress finding out what we agree on, what we don’t agree on, what we can still negotiate on and where we might take things into the future by co-operation. At the end, you may not have their decision or our decision as to policy - but a mutual decision,’’ he said.
Peters took exception, however, to questions over whether the Greens would have a say in approving his deal with Labour, saying reports of a potential ‘‘Labour-Greens Government’’ over the past three years were wrong. Later in the day - following a meeting with Labour - Peters said he had nothing against Green Party leader James Shaw.
‘‘You know full well ... I’ve never had a bad word with him, or about him, that you could possibly quote because I’ve never said something bad about him in my career.’’
Earlier, Shaw confirmed his trust in Labour leader Jacinda Ardern to negotiate a deal that won’t see his party locked out in the cold, or pushed beneath NZ First. Peters has ruled out including the Greens in partnership talks, forcing Shaw and his team to negotiate with Labour in parallel and in isolation to the NZ First negotiations.
As the talks entered into their fourth day, Shaw emerged from a two-hour meeting with Labour and said he was confident he could trust Labour would argue a fair deal on their behalf. But he would not be drawn on whether the Greens would say yes to any agreement placed in front of them.
‘‘Jacinda made fairness one of her principle values in the campaign, I’ve known her a number of years and, I said this before the election, I trust her and she seems to be doing a good job of it.
‘‘It’s got to be a stable and responsible Government that’s going to go the full distance in the national interest. Labour are working very hard on ensuring that happens. That’s of paramount concern to all of us,’’ he said.
Shaw said he was confident he would be happy with the deal Labour eventually presented to them.
NZ First and the Greens have had a strained relationship historically.
Peters began Wednesday in talks with National that stretched for more than two hours. He headed back into talks with Labour at 12.30pm. That meeting ended about 2.15pm.
Labour and NZ First’s negotiating teams got through the material faster than expected, he said.
Peters was to go back into talks with National at 4pm, then again with Labour at 6.30pm, where the parties would continue to talk about different policy areas. There had been no talk of ministerial portfolios thus far.
Following his first talk of the day with National, Peters hinted that his party’s deposit guarantee scheme was being considered.
‘‘The reality is that if we end up needing that it’d be a very parlous situation, but we still need to consider it.’’
On Tuesday, Peters backtracked on his self-imposed deadline of announcing the formation of a new Government by today. A decision was on track to be made by tonight, he said. However, that decision was unlikely to be made public then.
The decision would be announced as soon as possible after tonight but it also ‘‘depends on other parties’’ and he could not ‘‘answer for them’’.
NZ First’s board would be consulted on the preferred final agreement before the decision was signed off.
Each relevant party would also have constitutional procedures to carry out before a deal could be approved.