Green Party MP Darleen Tana has been kicked out of caucus after it was presented with the findings of an independent investigation into allegations of migrant exploitation.
While the report has not been released, party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said it showed Tana’s behaviour had fallen “far short” of caucus’ standards and was “completely at odds” with its values.
Green MPs unanimously voted in favour of asking for her resignation from the party and Parliament, after giving Tana and her lawyer an opportunity to respond to the allegations at an emergency caucus meeting on Saturday.
The ousted MP handed in her resignation before the end of the meeting and the co-leaders wrote to Speaker Gerry Brownlee to inform him Tana was no longer a member of the caucus.
Swarbrick told media that Tana had not yet followed through with the party’s request that she also resign from Parliament. When Elizabeth Kerekere resigned last year, she remained as an independent MP until the election.
There is a legal mechanism—often called the waka jumping rule—through which the party can oust an MP who leaves the party, however the Green Party has opposed its use in the past.
Swarbrick said the ball was in Tana’s court but these allegations of migrant exploitation were much more severe than previous controversies the party had faced.
“We are hoping that Darleen does the right thing and resigns from Parliament. If she doesn’t do that, further discussions will ensue,” she said.
The party plans to release an executive summary of the report but not until all the people who were named in the summary have been notified.
“To be clear, our preference would have been immediate release of the full report, but we must continue to follow good practice around privacy rights and law,” Swarbrick said.
Marama Davidson, the party’s other co-leader, was involved in the process despite being on leave to receive treatment after her recent cancer diagnosis.
“We are deeply disappointed that Darleen Tana has not been forthcoming about very serious breaches of Green Party kaupapa, and has not acknowledged nor taken accountability for the impact of her behaviour on others,” she said in a statement.
Swarbrick acknowledged it had been a difficult period for the party but asked for the media to not conflate tragedies, such as the death of Efeso Collins, with political scandals.
The party has now lost four MPs, or 25% of its caucus, since the election late last year — not counting Davidson’s temporary leave.
Hamilton-based teacher Benjamin Doyle was ranked at number 18 on the 2023 election list and presumably would be brought into Parliament if and when Tana resigns.
Tana would be able to stay on as an independent MP for the rest of the term, unless the Green Party was willing to break with precedent and force her out using the waka-jumping rule.
Swarbrick told reporters thousands of New Zealanders had voted for the Green Party to have 15 seats in Parliament but wouldn’t say if the party would force Tana to step down.
61 Comments
Not exclusive to the Greens by any means but surely all political parties need to take a serious look at their selection criteria for candidates. There have been far too many miscreants and far too much unacceptable, inappropriate behaviour and especially with regard to list mps. In the old days an electorate had the ability to boot out an undesirable parliamentarian. With the introduction of MMP the political parties were given responsibility to compile their list mps outside of any electorate control, and too often they have failed the general electorate, not respected that responsibility and introduced sub standard identities to parliament.
My theory, there is a high level of narcissism in wanting to be an MP and that would flow naturally into thinking you're above the law.
For sure. There is always the allure of post-political grift opportunities. English, Joyce, Robertson, Dame Jacinda Kate Laurell Ardern GNZM, Clark.
Would include Lord Key but he doesn't really need those opportunities financially. He's also a sucker for the ego stroking and emotional gratification that comes with power in the pvte sector.
"The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.
To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.
To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job." - Douglas Adams
True for every MP we have all of whom have proven they are more then willing to sell morals on the attempts for more likes or to appear in the news for whatever reason to help their reelection and huge pay packets first and foremost.
If ever they do something criminal or heinous & contrary to their position e.g. justice, small business etc then 1st claim mental health & get a diagnosis written from a short public paid, fast track, line skipping specialist appointment. Something most the public takes years to even get to referral and then years to diagnosis if they have thousands of dollars for private treatment access and travel... which many don't so they have decades without any specialist diagnosis & support yet now they are demonized publicly by MPs bad behaviour & seeking excuses to offset criminal actions.
Yep lets take a moment to time how long it will take for the excuses to come out and why it is so important for Darleen to stay picking up an MP wage while denying the pay and redress to the employees she abused. Say by not using the waka jumping policy "on principle"... yeah low ethics & honesty on full display.
Even sadder is those with the most experience in the fields in which they govern often never make it to leadership simply because of the long standing nepotism and glass ceiling. See many fields where decisions are made for constructive dismissal of experienced staff simply because they apply more standards to their work and perform better but are not the fashionable yes men that stoke egos and require higher wages then interns or those new to the area. Many of the senior staff already undertake leadership skilled positions (some with hundreds they manage and mentor) yet often they are kept outside leadership & management roles. Because leadership and management is more self aggrandizing marketing & nepotism then anyone admits honesty. In many other countries there is more experience in leadership roles. In NZ we hire those with no experience or from policy and arts to manage infrastructure, health, technology, national science research, food & agricultural standards, trade, education, justice etc. No wonder in NZ we have declining standards in many of these and in some cases intentionally stopped recording key markers so that they can worsen out of sight out of mind.
Even the career path of leadership in our CEOs and govt dept is a nightmare of cf failures. Take for instance Stephen Towns track record of actual work (esp in his last role which to say the least was open fraud).
It's not confined to list MPs, Michael Wood, Kiri Allan, Gaurav Sharma, Sam Uffindell, Andrew Falloon, Jami-Lee Ross and Todd Barclay were all electorate MPs, and there are many more.
If the scandal comes to light after the election, if the electorate wants to get rid of them the next chance is the next election. Parties can now use the waka jumping law to get rid of list MPs earlier.
Yes true enough, sadly there are many more.Here though, the Greens are somewhat hoist by their own petard as do they not vehemently oppose the waka jump criteria? That position of course, last year pre-election, allowed Ms Kerekere the cry baby accuser to remain in parliament as an independent, so there’s your precedent.
I know of a guy who was dismissed on the spot after gifting a client a pair of shoes - token of gratitude for long-term business relationship. Marched out with no time to really tidy up his computer. 20 years of service for a global data company who can claim responsibility for building the business across Asia. To be honest, I think the company was looking to cull high-cost senior management anyway.
Reason I cite this example is to provide a juxtaposition perspective for the clown show / rort that is NZ politics / public sector. Now I know the pvte sector isn't perfect and most of the Tana-like grift comes from industries like banking - which is in many ways tied to the hip of public institutions.
Yet in the private sector, well, private/public mixed sector that is 3 waters for example, you have an endless amount of "gifting" from large suppliers to contractors in the form of rebates, overseas trips, for awarding the supply of materials. All normalized of course, proprietary apps even exist to track spending milestones.
These contractors are installing an asset on behalf of the council/Government, and are effectively being bribed to send business a certain way. I might be drawing a long bow, but while dropping a box of pressie cards on the desk of a council employee would be frowned upon, an all expenses paid trip for the owner of a company employed by the council to spend $xx million is perfectly fine?
Yet in the private sector, well, private/public mixed sector that is 3 waters for example, you have an endless amount of "gifting" from large suppliers to contractors in the form of rebates, overseas trips, for awarding the supply of materials.
Completely agree. I addressed this and your example is spot on. Being a 'preferred supplier' to govt / public sector can be a gravy train.
Definitely. While the private sector does generally achieve a greater efficiency, without a robust set of rules around "arms length" arrangements this is what happens. Bigger players with much larger scale will find efficiencies/savings, but rather than the ratepayers/tax payers seeing some savings they will "reinvest" these savings into a backdoor loyalty rewards scheme to the contractor to influence spend.
In the case of 3 waters, you have 2 very large suppliers that start with the letter 'H' that have all facets of the market supply covered. One being in the Fletchers group of course....
The Greens have always strongly objected to parties sanctioning special people who got into Parliament on the party list & then chose to go their own entitled way. They have previously swallowed political dead rats to both support it as well as repeal it ("The Greens hate the bill and think it is anti-democratic and draconian".
James Shaw and Winston Peters go head to head over waka-jumping | RNZ News
So, they will be hypocrites if they don't dump Tana & worse hypocrites if they do.
That old get out of jail free card huh?
Not that it has helped anyone get out of the consequences of their actions that I can remember. You might remember better than me?
And the people saying that most likely had mental health issues or they wouldn't have ruined their lives doing stupid stuff.
Hmm, maybe they are using it as a reason to explain their behaviour when people ask what they were doing? And not just as an excuse?
Now it would appear though, that both opportunely and conveniently, Ms Tana has got a hold of the same Trump text book in so much that she believes she is the victim of a pre-determined political witch hunt. Greens, parliament and the electorate can now be considered here, as having been Trumped.
So you receive online abuse and turn into a serial shoplifter - absolute BS and if you think otherwise you’re delusional. Then to play this card and chuck on the PR overload afterwards to change the narrative is disgraceful.
Poor old Yvil, TPP etc would be serving a life term for theft right now if this excuse was the case!
They aren't the only ones. Bill English was paid $2500 a day from the 'Emergency Housing Fund' to write his ideas down about social housing in a report. The report cost $238 a word apparently.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2024/05/23/govt-paid-kainga-ora-reviewers-out-of…
look at this photo, this was how brave the welsh where.... a whole stadium
https://www.allblacks.com/news/principality-stadium-set-for-first-sell-…
29 OCTOBER 2021 - Auckland was in level3 but well most where buying beers and going to mates to watch rugby etc on sky...
This game was the end for the rules in NZ we all watched it and said WTF
You left out the /sarc
The woman who achieved an unprecedented mandate in 2020 who then rapidly lost control of her caucus thereby enabling the attempted racist ethnostate & then walked away (blaming NZdrs misogyny because she couldn't handle the truth) before the electorate could dump her with the largest vote reversal.
I am curious as to the high level of support the Greens receive- 10-12% in most polls. I can’t help but wonder if a large proportion of this support vote for the Greens without any knowledge of their policies or candidates. They simply vote for them in the belief they are environmentally friendly.
There is much truth in that in so much of the perception of the well founded Green political movement globally and its electorate strength in such as Germany. For instance our elderly neighbours vote for the Greens without fail, willy nilly, and in their own way, believe they are voting for Greenpeace. At the other end of the scale you might well find similar idealistic motivations from the voters still in their teens.
You can mark the downfall of the greens from the White CIS Male days
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/131632938/fact-checking-marama-davidso…
If you make idiots co-leaders they will lead to to political Oblivion
I would think the investigation by the KC has found evidence both clear and damning. So much so that the Greens cannot find any loophole or way out to smooth it over. It was and is, a case of open and shut. Probably this was put before them months ago and in the interim they have been seeking a way to convince Ms Tana that she should leave parliament, in good grace. Ms Tana though is intransigent obviously. It cannot help but reflect poorly and worryingly on just what sort of ship the Greens are manning and sailing, culturally and responsibly. It will never come to light of course but if the disharmony and discord is as it appears to be, given recent outbursts, defections and departures, provided pressure that their unfortunate former member caught stealing, was the subject of, and it actually came from within their own caucus.
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