Labour is trying to force a by-election

Labour leader Phil Goff says ousted MP Chris Carter doesn’t have a man­date to remain as MP for Te Atatu.

Mr Carter was thrown out of the Labour cau­cus yes­ter­day on a unan­i­mous vote after send­ing an unsigned let­ter to media rep­re­sen­ta­tives in an attempt to under­mine Mr Goff’s leadership.

Spectacular….this is going to be a mas­sive filip for National in the polls. Peo­ple do not like nasty blood-letting.

As I said yes­ter­day if I was Chris Carter I would resign and force the broke, busted, dis-united Labour Party try and fight me off.

Mr Goff told reporters in Auck­land today Mr Carter should recon­sider that.

“That deci­sion con­sti­tu­tion­ally is his, but he was elected as a Labour MP and he no longer has that man­date. He needs to reflect on that,” Mr Goff said.

“I think that he does not have a man­date to be the Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment for Te Atatu, given the with­drawal of sup­port from the Labour Party.”

This is impor­tant here for Goff, at the moment Chris Carter is still a Labour MP. They haven’t thrown him out of the party. Does Phil Goff have the stones to take that step. Until he does then all this talk is sim­ple blus­ter as the two men stare each other down.

It also looks like Phil Twyford, the hap­less Mem­ber for the home­less, has been spiked again.

When Labour’s national coun­cil meets in a week’s time it is almost cer­tain to sus­pend Mr Carter’s party mem­ber­ship. A new Te Atatu can­di­date would then have to be selected for the next election.

Radio New Zealand‘s polit­i­cal staff say it seems likely the party will look out­side its cau­cus for a candidate.

Mr Carter says he’ll stay as on as an inde­pen­dent MP until the next elec­tion, but will give his vote to Labour.

This is going to be the tough­est part for Labour because the LEC chair is Peter Kaiser. If he stands firm then Labour will have a prob­lem with selec­tions. it is clear though that they intend to strip Chris Carter of his nom­i­na­tion for Te Atatu and to also find a replace­ment can­di­date mean­ing almost cer­tainly he is about to be Taito’d, chucked igno­min­iously from the Labour party, for speak­ing the truth.

The most telling for Labour is their utter para­noia of the “Tizard Effect”. Their ret­i­cence to talk about a sit­ting MP tak­ing the nom­i­na­tion shows just how deeply un-popular Judith Tizard is.

For me though I think the most appalling stance taken by Labour is to ques­tion Chris Carter’s men­tal health, and to ques­tion it openly. This shows just how car­ing and shar­ing the Labour party really is, they are busily try­ing to spin and knife Chris Carter by now label­ing him as men­tal. Phil Goff doesn’t deserve to be leader if this is to be their strat­egy to side-line Chris Carter.

Labour is in a real pickle. It is clear from my dis­cus­sions with some Labour cau­cus mem­bers that Carter is both right and wrong. Let me explain, Chris Carter is right in say­ing that no-one thinks that Labour can win the next elec­tion, with Phil goff or any­one else for that mat­ter, he is wrong though that cau­cus thinks there is some­one else who could do bet­ter, there sim­ply isn’t. Not a sin­gle name has been prof­fered to me as a sug­gested replace­ment for Phil. The over­all feel­ing seems to be that like him or loathe Phil Goff is the leader only in the absence of any­one else.

One thing about Helen Clark, she ruled cau­cus with an iron fist, Phil Goff has let this get away on him.

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Related Posts:

• If you have to defend it, it’s dead already
• Could it be 7 by-elections?
• Now Carter has a lawyer
• Is the Labour party democratic?
• Turn­ing a Chicken Run into a vic­tory in 2011

Tagged as: Judith Tizard • New Zealand Labour Party • Peter Kaiser • Phil Goff • Politics • Radio New Zealand • Te Atatu