Posted by Blogger Name. Category:
Dominion-Post
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Hone Harawira
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Internet Party
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Kim Dotcom
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Mana Party
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Marriage of convenience
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MegaMana
The Dominion-Post editorial this morning predictably touches on the "marriage of convenience" between Kim Dotcom and Hone Harawira and their parties. And it's not a positive editorial; under the headline Marriage unlikely to last the editorial begins:
So the Maori radical and the German squillionaire have spawned their odd little party. No surprise there. The deal suits both partners. The Internet Party now has a chance of getting into Parliament whereas before it had none. And Mana wins a chance of finding more supporters among the geeks and the worshippers of Kim Dotcom.
Radicals like Mana's John Minto reject Sue Bradford's charge that they have sold out to the wealthy German. Bradford, staunch and true to her ideals as usual, has predictably stormed out. But, in a sense, Minto is right. He has not abandoned his support for progressive taxes and soaking the rich. He has not had to swallow a dead rat.
The real objection to this political marriage is that it is unlikely to last or breed many successes. The two sides will be able to agree on a few things. They will want to spread more of the benefits of the internet to the poor. They will want to hobble the GCSB and put it under much tougher scrutiny. They will band together in an attempt to defeat John Key and his party.
But even these agreed goals will be very hard to reach. Perhaps the pair will score minor victories over internet speeds and cellphone fees. They will get nowhere with the GCSB unless they can persuade Labour to join them, which is doubtful. The GCSB needs much tougher accountability but Labour has traditionally been weak on this. It is a status quo party when it comes to intelligence. And National is still riding high.
The marriage of convenience is likely to become hollow even if a couple of MPs make it into the House. On the hard issues of economics – tax rates on the wealthy, for instance – it is difficult to believe Mana and the Internet Party will agree. They will have to have a big "agree to disagree" policy clause. So they will make little difference.
The Dom-Post's leader writer is dead right. Issues like the GCSB and internet speeds/access are not the issues that change governments. On economic issues, how can a party with a billionaire who flaunts his wealth possibly combine credibly with a party that purports to resent rich people like Kim Dotcom?
The editorial continues, with a condemnation of the rules that make this ill-fated union possible:
The merger of the two shows up, once again, a bad flaw in the MMP system. The system gives far too much power to single constituency-seat parties, because they can avoid the 5 per cent parliamentary threshold. This has allowed self-serving deals that have given non-entity parties such as ACT and UnitedFuture too much power in coalition governments.
And nobody knows why this silly provision ever became part of MMP. The members of the royal commission that recommended the system now say the "Epsom clause" was a mistake.
The only question now is: will this political oddity, bred on the wrong side of the bed, have any appeal to the voters? Its best hope is to win about 2 per cent of the party vote – double what Mana got last time – and bring the still-unnamed leader of the Internet Party in on the list. If Annette Sykes won Waiariki, that would be a big dollop of cream on the cake.
Maybe the geeks and the radical Maori and Pakeha can persuade enough voters to back their odd little band. It's also perfectly possible that Harawira will lose his seat to Labour and Sykes will fail in Waiariki. That would sink the Internet Party, which will certainly not pass the 5 per cent barrier by itself. The whole strange experiment could easily collapse.
We'll certainly be cheering for Kelvin Davis to win the seat of Te Tai Tokerau, and for Te Ururoa Flavell to retain Waiariki, because we strongly doubt MegaMana's ability to get to 5% of the vote. Wouldn't it be funny if Harawira was unseated, and all Dotcom's money went down the river?
