Winston Peters, leader of New Zealand First. Photo / Steven McNicholl
Winston Peters, leader of New Zealand First. Photo / Steven McNicholl
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has ended months of speculation, announcing he won't be standing in an electorate this election.
Instead the party will try to reach the five per cent threshold required for parliamentary representation under MMP, if it wins no electorate.
New Zealand First, which is hopingto return to parliament after Mr Peters failed to win Tauranga in 2008, has released its party list today.
Mr Peters takes the top spot, but will not compete for the seat he held for more than 20 years, allowing him to campaign around the country, the party's board said.
Tracey Martin, who is standing in Rodney, is second on the list, followed by former North Shore mayor Andrew Williams, who is standing in the North Shore seat.
Richard Prosser, who is competing for Waimakariri and Barbara Stewart, standing in Waikato, rounds out the top five.
Mr Peters lost his Tauranga seat to National's Bob Clarkson in 2005 and failed to regain it in 2008 when National put up youthful local lawyer Simon Bridges.
The party received 4.07 per cent of the party vote at the 2008 but won no seat , so it lost representation in Parliament.
Act polled less than New Zealand First, with 3.65 per cent of the party vote, but because Rodney Hide won Epsom, it was entitled to five seats in the House.
Mr Peters was asked at the Business New Zealand Conference in Wellington if he would say what seat he would stand in.
After his speech, Business NZ chief executive Phil O'Reilly wondered aloud whether Mr Peters knew what kind of audience he had been speaking too, so strong was his attack on business.
Mr Peters said capitalism had lost its integrity and sense of social conscience.
"There are chief executives and senior managers in the corporate sector who have given a whole new meaning to the terms greed and avarice.
"Somehow the pay and prestige for those at the top seems to be immune from actual performance - a new greedocracy devoid of redeeming features.''
Big business was quick to demand loyalty ''and a scrimping lifestyle from its workers'' but at the drop of a hat it was off to China "where the communists keep millions of workers in what many of you socially concede is one step above slavery.''
Referring to currency speculators, Mr Peters said they used the foreign exchange systems like a big TAB.
"Why not take these leeches off our landscape and peg our currency to our main trading partners. Give the exporters in the engine room a fair go.''
