This is an online exclusive story.
Analysis: Labour released its ranked party list on Monday. For most of us, the election is simply when we vote in October, and we may or may not pay attention to politics during the campaign. But for the majority of MPs and party candidates, there’s a prior contest: lower profile but more brutal, and often more decisive. The quiet but ruthless struggle for party list ranking.
There are 72 electorate seats in Parliament and 48 list seats. When parties draw up their lists they rank their candidates in descending numerical order. Candidates who don’t win an electorate can enter into Parliament on the list – if their party gets enough votes and that candidate enjoys a high enough list ranking. So a good position can mean success or failure in a political career.
But the lists are more than that. They’re an expression of the party’s hierarchy: who is valuable and who is not. Every MP and candidate is acutely aware of who is ranked above them (all overrated, arrogant, obsolete has-beens) and who is beneath them (legions of scheming, untrustworthy upstarts). The list is never far from their minds.
The most notable declines in Labour’s list this year are Michael Wood (23 to 45) and Phil Twyford (4 to 49): both former senior ministers. The first disgraced himself with a conflict of interest scandal over shares he failed to declare; the second failed to deliver in the high-profile housing and transport portfolios. Both hold safe seats so they’re unlikely to be voted out of Parliament – but low rankings are often a signal from the leadership: a not very gentle suggestion that perhaps you should do something else with your life?
The biggest promotion goes to Barbara Edmonds (49 to 18), a former parliamentary staffer – a caste of people who increasingly dominate our politics no matter which party is in government. Parliament is a very complicated workplace, and experienced staffers who become MPs can hit the ground running in a way that’s almost impossible for anyone outside Wellington to compete with. Chris Hipkins, Jacinda Ardern, Grant Robertson, Nicola Willis and Chris Bishop are all former Beehive staffers.
Second largest leap: Willow-Jean Prime (36 to 9), the candidate for Northland – she captured this from National in 2020. This year it is probably not a winnable seat. Prime was first appointed to Cabinet at the start of the year and is the only Maori woman in Labour’s top 20 after the resignation of Kiri Allan. Ginny Anderson (45 to 17) – another former staffer – has enjoyed a spectacular rise via the Dead Man’s Boots mechanism. She became Police Minister when Stuart Nash resigned and then Justice Minister a few weeks later when Kiri Allan stood down.
The fourth biggest winner is Jan Tinetti (32 to 6), standing in Tauranga. Not a winnable seat. Tinetti was forced to apologise to Parliament after the Privileges Committee found she acted with a “high degree of negligence” in misleading Parliament over her statements about school truancy.
The Early Childhood announcement in this year’s budget was a fiasco; the teachers keep striking and most of the universities are in dire financial straits. You’d think all that would merit a demotion at least, but factions also play a powerful role in party list rankings and Tinetti was on the national committee of the New Zealand Educational Institute – arguably the country’s most powerful union. So there she is.
There are various theories about what went wrong with Labour over the past year. One of the more plausible is that their previous lists didn’t bring enough talent into the caucus. They had a tidal wave of new MPs in 2020, but most of them weren’t any good, and most will wash back out again this year. This meant that capable ministers were given impossible workloads, while the handful of promising new MPs were promoted too quickly, without any mentoring because no one had time for hand-holding.
You can see them trying to fix that here: they’re shuffling out underperformers – at least as far as they can without upsetting the party’s different factions – and they’re bringing promising MPs forward and injecting new blood. Trying to build a party that can help its leadership run the country. Or, if that tidal wave runs out too fast, take over as leaders when they’re swept out to opposition.
Labour’s full list:
- Chris Hipkins
- Kelvin Davis
- Carmel Sepuloni
- Grant Robertson
- Megan Woods
- Jan Tinetti
- Ayesha Verrall
- Willie Jackson
- Willow-Jean Prime
- Damien O’Connor
- Adrian Rurawhe
- Andrew Little
- David Parker
- Peeni Henare
- Priyanca Radhakrishnan
- Kieran McAnulty
- Ginny Andersen
- Barbara Edmonds
- Jo Luxton
- Duncan Webb
- Rino Tirikatene
- Deborah Russell
- Rachel Brooking
- Jenny Salesa
- Tangi Utikere
- Camilla Belich
- Tracey McLellan
- Shanan Halbert
- Glen Bennett
- Vanushi Walters
- Georgie Dansey
- Dan Rosewarne
- Naisi Chen
- Anahila Kanongata’a
- Angela Roberts
- Tāmati Coffey
- Ibrahim Omer
- Neru Leavasa
- Toni Boynton
- Anna Lorck
- George Hampton
- Rachel Boyack
- Angie Warren-Clark
- Liz Craig
- Michael Wood
- Terisa Ngobi
- Helen White
- Arena Williams
- Phil Twyford
- Steph Lewis
- Sarah Pallett
- Ingrid Leary
- Lemauga Lydia Sosene
- Parewhati Taikato
- Estefania Muller-Pallarès
- Fleur Fitzsimons
- Reuben Davidson
- Nick Ruane
- Fesaitu Solomone
- Mark Hutchinson
- Nerissa Henry
- Myra Williamson
- Oscar Sims
- Aladdin Al-Bustanji
- Gwendoline Keel
- Kharag Singh
- Emma Dewhirst
- Zulfiqar Butt
- Ben Sandford
- Simon McCullum
- Guy Wishart
- Deborah Rhodes
- Jamie Toko
- Luke Jones
- Beryl Riley
- Ethan Reille
