The fate of Darleen Tana now lies in the hands of Green Party members after the two leaders formally began the process of having their former colleague removed from parliament at the party’s AGM in Christchurch last weekend.
On September 1, party representatives will meet again to decide whether the so-called ‘party-hopping’ legislation should be used against Tana.
But the debate over the use of the legislation has already led to division, with three GroenLinks members deciding to leave the party.
Pasifika Greens members Marie Laufiso, Alofa Aiono and Vasemaca Tavola resigned from the Greens on Sunday, with Laufiso reading a letter at the AGM.
The letter, which was published in full on Radio Waatea, said the three members felt “culturally unsafe” with the Greens and had suffered and witnessed actions that “degraded, humiliated and disempowered their cultural, spiritual and family well-being”.
Their resignations came shortly after the co-leaders confirmed they had written to Tana saying the now-independent MP’s continued presence was disrupting the proportionality of parliament.
“Not only because we are now reduced to 14 MPs and 14 votes in Parliament, compared to 15 at the last general election, but also because of the implications for, for example, Question Time and our parliamentary budget.
“This limits our ability to run the election campaign that the people of this country voted for 330,000 times in the most recent election,” said Greens co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick.
The mention of the budget appeared to worry the three members, who said the process was being rushed because of the budget, not because of Tana’s alleged treatment of migrant workers.
They said Tana’s “character, integrity and mana” were being smeared. They said it “again raised parallels” with the party’s treatment of former MP Elizabeth Kerekere (Aiono is married to Kerekere). They also observed a double standard in the co-leaders’ statements about Tana, compared to those they made about Julie-Anne Genter.
“To downplay her behaviour because an apology was offered rings hollow given that both female Māori MPs were silenced, banned from appearing in parliament and given no choice but to resign.
“Why were they so hypocritically expected to adhere to this mythical standard of behavior while others do not?” Laufiso asked.
The three members also believed the party had ignored the Pasifika Greens following the death of Fa’anānā Efeso Collins.
“We, the Samoans, collectively carry with us a considerable cultural knowledge, made up of hundreds of years of lived experience of fa’alavelave such as this.
“Yet we were not asked for advice or guidance. No welfare checks for us, nor an invitation to assist the party while members of the entire motu were in grief and shock,” Laufiso said.
Speaking to the media before the resignations and shortly after the letter was sent to Tana, Swarbrick said the best way to limit the damage and any further collateral damage was for Tana to resign. The party would then be able to avoid the issue of party hopping altogether.
“Let me be very clear: this sucks. This is not a situation that I think any of us or our party wanted to be confronted with. But we’ve been there, so we’re dealing with it.”
She said Tana had “betrayed” the Greens’ principles and failed to respond to texts, calls or emails from co-leader Marama Davidson who – despite being out of parliament due to treatment for breast cancer – wanted to take charge of the outreach.
Writing a letter to the MP in question is a requirement of the party switch legislation. Tana has 21 days to respond to the co-leaders’ letter.
But Swarbrick said the final step – writing to the Speaker of Parliament – would not happen without the party’s approval.
“We are a party that prides ourselves on having a wide range of opinions and that we love a story, that we like to take an issue apart and put it back together again, and that we examine it from all sorts of different perspectives.
“It’s probably one of the most Green Party-like things in the world: setting up a process to make a decision, involving our members, in terms of how we’re going to set up that process in the first place.”
About 200 party representatives will meet with their branches between now and September 1 to discuss the option and Tana’s possible defense.
They then hold an extraordinary general meeting, where 75% of the delegates must decide to switch parties before the co-leaders write a letter to the president.
Despite the resignations, members RNZ spoke to outside the general meeting were largely satisfied with the outcome.
“The Greens would not engage in that process without thinking carefully about the consequences on every occasion,” said one member.
Another, who said he was relatively new to the party, said he was impressed by the member-driven process.
“It ensures that a fair decision can be made,” they said.
“The process has always been carried out with the Green membership and Green values at the forefront,” said another member.
However, no one was willing to give an opinion on the legislation itself, or on whether it should be used.
Throughout the weekend, Swarbrick maintained that the Tana situation was merely part of the AGM. She and Davidson were reconfirmed as co-leaders, and in Davidson’s absence, Swarbrick gave both keynote addresses.
Her first call was to encourage members to overcome some “growing pains” and make time for “slow, new, possibly difficult” conversations if they wanted the Green movement to grow.
Swarbrick outlined a vision that the Green Party could become not only the dominant green movement in the world, but also the dominant force within the New Zealand left. But this could only happen if its members rolled up their sleeves.
In her speech, she instructed the members to convince people who may agree with Groen’s values, but who had never voted Groen or who were no longer interested in politics at all.
She said she had spoken to people who voted for her in Auckland Central but they could not bring themselves to give their vote to the Greens at the last election. (The Greens got 8,503 votes; the National Party got 11,751.)
Before his death, Fa’anānā Efeso had discussed with Collins plans to increase outreach in South Auckland, a traditional Labor Party stronghold, Swarbrick said.
Swarbrick’s second speech of the weekend was on the government’s climate and social policies. She asked members to get 10 people they knew to sign an open letter to the prime minister about tenants’ rights — and then get those 10 people to talk to 10 other people, and so on.
It suited the Greens’ flaxroots campaign style, but members RNZ spoke to were keen to take on the challenge and do more for the movement.
“I don’t blame people for wanting to switch off. It can be tiring, and that’s what Christopher Luxon wants people to do.
“But the best way I’ve found is to just find something in common with someone, and when they start complaining about it, you’re like, ‘Yeah, me too, man!’” one member said.
“While life can be quite tough, we must continue to work on building relationships between elections with the people who are being hit so hard by current policies,” said another.
One member admitted that the Greens have not done enough in the past for certain communities, such as South Auckland and the Pacific communities.
“A large part of it will be about reaching groups who are not yet aware that the Green mission already aligns with their personal core values.”
rnz.co.nz
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