On behalf of the Alliance Party I would like to make a couple of comments about your April 6 article on New Zealand politics entitled "Redrawing the political map". The concern is that readers of the article may have gained the impression that New Zealand's democratic socialist party, the Alliance, is dead and gone.
The Alliance Party is running 12 candidates in key electorates in the 2005 election, and as a registered political party (requiring 500 or more financial) members, we are running a substantial number of candidates for the party-list vote in our MMP system. We have restructured the party to a more collective, grassroots-based organisation.
We have active branches in all the main centres, as well as some other areas, and are already beginning to receive some good coverage in the mainstream media for our campaign. The "decline" your writer talks about is now in reverse as the Alliance has set itself clear goals and is rebuilding. Membership is slowly but steadily increasing.
Thus it would be misleading to create a picture of the Left in New Zealand that simply "paints out" the Alliance Party.
Matt McCarten was leader of the Alliance up to late last year following the 2002 election. There was considerable debate in 2004 about whether the Alliance should continue as an independent organisation, or merely support other parties with which there was some area of common ground, and become a kind of left-wing discussion group. The end result was that the majority of Alliance members decided we needed to continue to offer a clear left-wing alternative — which we are now doing.
McCarten's comments about the Maori Party reported in GLW do not give a full and correct picture in our view. The main focus of the Maori Party has been on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill, which denies Maori the right to go to the courts to obtain private property rights in this area.
However, it has not been apparent at all the Maori Party leadership have strong left-wing or socialist or "working class" policies. For example, their leader Tariana Turia voted against the civil union bill that gives equal rights to gay couples who want to formalise their relationship. She has also described her politics as not "left or right wing" but kaupapa-driven, that is, based on Maori values and systems. What policies this approach will give is as yet largely unclear in many areas.
To point this out is not to denigrate the Maori Party, merely to take a more realistic view of their development and focus.
In addition, although the Maori Party claims to have a large membership base, its support is naturally enough concentrated in the Maori electorates, and even then it is only gathering a minority of support among Maori (around 14% of New Zealand population identify as Maori, and polling has indicated the Maori Party has between 1% and 3% overall support).
McCarten departed from the Alliance leadership and began work with the Maori Party as campaign manager, but was soon asked to stand down when it became public he was organising with others to form a new "broad left" party. Obviously the Maori Party leadership were not comfortable with this dual role, which is understandable.
This new "broad left" party has not materialised, but McCarten's actions around forming this new party were widely reported in the mainstream New Zealand media, including an article from NZPA on February 24, 2005 which is currently still viewable at <http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3197428a6160,00.html>.
A high profile Labour MP John Tamihere, claimed in that article that he had been approached to join this new party, but had declined the invitation. Tamihere has more recently gone on the record in an interview in which he attacked unions, gays, women, Jews, and Maori, and said he had high regard for the National Party finance spokesperson.
As you can see, the situation on the New Zealand left has been rather more complicated than your readers may have learned from your recent article.
The Alliance Party sends its best wishes to our Australian friends and we will keep you informed on our progress.
Victor Billot (Alliance Party communications)
Dunedin
From Green Left Weekly, April 20, 2005.
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