Green Party dismisses NationalGreen speculation

Wellington: Green Party leader James Shaw is focused on forming a government with the Labour Party and everything else is just ‘noise’, he says.

New Zealand First will head into preliminary talks later in the week with both National and Labour.

The possibility of National and the Greens coming together to form a government has been floated by some commentators. But Mr Shaw said that speculation was getting a bit boring.

“Our job is to form a government with the Labour Party, that’s what I said on election night, that’s what I campaigned on for the last 18 months and that’s what we are busy working on.

“I said on election night that I think the numbers are there for a new government and that’s what we are working on, so everything else frankly is noise and no signal.”

Mr Shaw said talk of a ‘Teal Deal’ is all being fed through proxies and is all PR and fluff, saying there was no substance to it. Asked whether he believed it was a paid campaign to promote the idea of a National-Greens deal, Mr Shaw said he did not know, and he did not care. “I’m busy trying to form a government with the Labour Party and presumably with New Zealand First as well, and I said on election night if Bill [English] wants to call, I’m happy to take the call and to have a conversation with him, but he hasn’t called, so as far as I’m concerned, everything else is pure speculation.”

Our job is to form a government with the Labour Party... James Shaw Green Party leader

James Shaw.