KEY POINTS:
New immigrant John Lee from Hong Kong was waiting excitedly outside the Mt Eden War Memorial Hall on Saturday when he heard the Prime Minister was coming to launch the Labour Party's first ethnic campaign.
But like about 150 others in the hall, Mr Lee was left disappointed
as Helen Clark instead attended the Diwali celebrations at Auckland's Viaduct Harbour.
It was left to Trade Minister Phil Goff to carry Labour's flag at the launch.
With a poll that morning putting Labour on 33 per cent compared with National's 51, he was quick to seize the opportunity to distance his party from Winston Peters' anti-immigration stance to an audience of mainly immigrants.
Mr Goff received applause when, without naming Mr Peters or NZ First, he said: "The leader of one political party has again raised the issue of cutting immigration. I want to say that it is a tired old tactic to try to blame one section of the community for problems that they are not in any way responsible for."
Unlike that party, he said, Labour was "committed to a multicultural society where we welcome people from a wide range of countries".
Following National leader John Key's decision to rule out Mr Peters from any future National coalition, National's Asian candidates have been telling ethnic voters "a vote for Labour is a vote for New Zealand First". (NZ First has been Labour's partner for the past three years.)
It was a message that resonated much more strongly with Asian voters after Mr Peters called the free trade agreement Mr Goff signed with Beijing "foolish" and suggested stopping immigrants, who were "attracted to New Zealand like moths to a neon light", from coming here by making changes, including cutting the immigration quota 80 per cent.
Mr Key and Helen Clark were busy campaigning for the ethnic vote at the weekend.
After launching National's ethnic campaign in central Auckland on Friday, Mr Key went pitching for Chinese votes in an interview with a local Chinese television station.
On Saturday, Helen Clark toured Botany - an electorate where Chinese and other migrants outnumber others - and posed for photographs with supporters.
Both leaders attended the Diwali celebrations with their ethnic candidates.
Labour candidate and ethnic campaign organiser Farida Sultana said the Prime Minister had not been scheduled to attend the launch in Mt Eden.
"People got excited only because there was a rumour on the day that Helen Clark could be coming. But it has always been quite clear to me that the Prime Minister does not attend any of the candidates' campaign launches."