Dunne retires

Peter Dunne announced yesterday he will not contest Ohariu and is retiring from politics.

Dunne has served in the executive if basically every Government from the 4th Labour Government on.

His record includes:

• 4th Labour – Parliamentary Undersecretary and Minister of Regional Development
• 5th National – Minister of Inland Revenue and Internal Affairs
• 5th Labour – Minister of Revenue
• 5th National – Minister of Inland Revenue and Internal Affairs

I doubt any other politician has served in four seperate Governments, including two Labour led and two Nationa led. And he has been a very competent Minister in all of them. Also as someone who often held the balance of power on various pieces of legislation, he played a straight bat. On a couple of issues important to the Internet industry, Dunne listened to the arguments and came down on the right side.

Obviously he was concerned he might not win Ohariu if he stood again. It will now be a straight contest between Brett Hudson and Greg O’Connor. In 2014 National got 50.4% of the party vote and Labour 23.5%. Of course O’Connor has been campaigning for some months while Hudson had been running a party vote only campaign.