Young Labour vs Willie Jackson

An open letter from some members of Young Labour is asking Labour’s NZ Council to reject his application to be a candidate. They cite four grounds:

Roastbusters Rape Apologist

During the 2013 Roast Busters investigation Mr Jackson, along with his co-host John Tamihere, interviewed a young woman on their RadioLIVE show who was close to some of the victims and familiar with the case. During the interview Jackson engaged in a line of questioning that blamed the alleged victims and mocked the interviewee.

Jackson refuted the interviewee’s allegation that the young men involved were rapists, saying “girls shouldn’t be drinking anyway, should they?”, “how free and easy are you kids these days?”, and referring to the accusations as “mischief”, before asking the young woman when she had lost her virginity.

It was a terrible interview.

Comments about LGBT New Zealanders

Mr Jackson seeks to join the party that introduced Homosexual Law Reform and marriage equality, but says he is “a little uncomfortable with gay men”. As a talkback host he interrogated a Labour MP and leadership candidate about his sexuality. He followed this appalling interview with a column which dressed up his homophobia as remorse on behalf of a country ‘not ready’ for a gay Prime Minister.

I suspect Grant Robertson is not keen on Jackson becoming a Labour MP, but of course part of what Little is doing is building a more loyal caucus that will allow him to defeat a Gracinda challenge if Labour are in Opposition again after the election.

Advocacy for Charter Schools

Willie Jackson has publicly advocated for charter schools. He led an organisation to establish two of National’s charter schools and publicly questioned Labour’s commitment to the educational progress of New Zealand’s children.

Willie Jackson is not the only person in Labour to back charter schools. Most of their Maori MPs do, but the unions hold too much sway.

Lack of renewal and women in caucus

Even if Willie Jackson had not advocated such offensive positions in sharp contrast to Labour’s values and the dignity of those we seek to represent, he remains the past, not future of Labour politics. The New Zealand Labour Party is lucky to count amongst its ranks many potential candidates with immense potential, drive and energy to renew our caucus.

We the undersigned are extremely concerned that high ranked list positions are being promised to men, contrary to the constitutional requirement that the list moderation committee makes decisions that would result in equal numbers of men and women in caucus following the election. Given the composition of Labour held electorates, very high places on the list must be given to women for it to be constitutional, and a promise to give Mr Jackson a high position would threaten this.

Yep the first six or seven list positions should go to women before you can even rank Parker and Mallard let alone Jackson. The only female Labour List MP is Sue Moroney (assuming Ardern wins Mt Roskill). So there should be six new female candidates ranked higher than Jackson, let alone Raymond Huo who is set to return.