Labour list ranking delayed after Willie realises he was conned
Jo Moir reports:
A “crisis meeting” is being held by Labour’s list ranking committee and it’s likely prospective Labour candidate Willie Jackson will be given a higher place.
It’s understood he was given the 21st slot on Labour’s original list and wasn’t happy about it.
Jackson, a high profile broadcaster and former Alliance MP, is said to have flown down to Wellington on Monday morning to take his frustrations to the party first-hand.
The party was expected to announce its list around mid-morning but has now pushed it out to Tuesday morning while the party works through the ranking issues. A Labour Party source said a “crisis meeting” would be held on Monday night and it was expected Jackson would get a higher list ranking as a result.
It’s understood the delay is also because other electorate candidates are disappointed with their list ranking.
Jackson, who had ties to the Maori Party, was shoulder-tapped by Labour leader Andrew Little late last year to run and announced at Waitangi that would he seek a place on the list.
Little threw his support behind Jackson getting a high-list placing.
But Northland and East Coast candidates, Willow-Jean Prime and Kiri Allan, look to have secured list spots ahead of Jackson – likely helped by Labour’s 50/50 gender policy.
Willie was warned about the gender policy and that Little was making promises he couldn’t deliver.
Until we see the full list we won’t know what chances Willie has, but we can do an estimate based on what we sort of know to work out his effective placing. So who is ahead of him
- current electorate seats – 27
- current MPs – Little, Parker, Mallard, Huo
- New cands – Price, Allan, O’Connor
So Jackson may be effectively 35th on the list. That means Labour would need at least 28% to get Jackson in, which is far from the guaranteed spot he thought he was getting.
If he does now get bumped further up the list, then you’ll have some very angry candidates who get ranked below him – especially if they then miss out making Parliament.