Pachiderm

I felt the need to comment on the Green Party's annual general meeting which was held over the earlier part of the weekend.

Russel Norman was elected as the new male co-leader of the party. He's no Rod Donald yet, but he seems to have what it takes to be a practical face for the party. Norman's election to the co-leadership is important because I believe it heralds a move towards the Green Party attempting to deradicalise their public image. Nandor Tanczos is associated with particularly contentious issues -- ones that certainly don't have the populist potential of some of the Greens' other approaches -- and had he secured the co-leadership, which would have been a possibility because he was second in the party election behind Norman, it's possible the party would be on borrowed time. People from outside of the party faithful have already started complaining about the fact that he's Australian but that's the way it goes I guess; and ultimately their opinion doesn't matter anyway, because they're not in the Green pool of support.

Another significant feature of the event was the Greens' adjustment of their alignment with Labour. As the Herald noted, the Greens are seeking to "reassert their independence and disown the political left as their home." This could be taken as an attempt to appeal further to their support pool, many of whom are in fact students or other people who perceive themselves to be radical, alternative and unique. It would be fair to say that many supporters do not want to feel associated with the Labour Party, especially in light of its recent forays rightwards towards the centre, and its stance on roads that was revealed in the most recent Budget.

But perhaps the biggest upset was Jeanette Fitzsimons's declaration that the Green Party would consider entering into an agreement with National if the major party were to commit to policies of sustainable growth, even though as reported in the Herald they "would work with National and Labour on an issue basis and any closer relationships would be determined election by election." This is despite the Greens' decidedly left-wing disposition ("support for the oppressed and disadvantaged and in the battle over more social services or tax cuts") being in significant contrast to National's more neo-liberal, entrepreneurially-oriented approaches to the same areas. Whether this is a divergence from the key social democratic principles of the Green Party in favour of putting the environmental issues at the fore remains to be seen in practice.

Throughout the meeting the speakers emphasised their perceived folly of Finance Minister Michael Cullen's extra road funding that was assigned in the Budget, repeatedly alluding to the fact that he should "get out of his limo" and take public transport with the common man, to get an idea of how overcrowded and generally inadequate it is. Jeanette Fitzsimons also ventured at one point that "if the battle is between tax cuts and a massive spending splurge on new roads in the middle of a long-term oil crisis, we might even go for tax cuts." The scope for moving further astray from the left ideology of the party is certainly there and it seems to me that the Greens are planning such moves.