Since the landslide defeat of the Labor-Greens government in the October 2023 New Zealand election, the Green Party has been plagued by a series of scandals and resignations.
With the resignation of co-chairman James Shaw, who left parliament this month, the party has lost four MPs in five months (including the death of MP Efeso Collins in February) and a fifth now faces several “bullying” charges. For a party with just 15 seats in parliament this is a serious level of disruption.
The instability comes as the party tries to refresh its brand after six years of being part of a right-wing, pro-imperialist government under both the Labor Party and, between 2017 and 2020, the far-right New Zealand First Party.
The Labor-led government has overseen rising poverty, deepening homelessness and soaring social inequality: by the end of 2023, an estimated 600,000 people were regularly using charity food banks. It also involved New Zealand in preparations for war with China and a US-NATO proxy war against Russia, sending troops to the UK to train Ukrainians.
Currently in opposition, the Greens are trying to give themselves a more “progressive” image and wash their hands of any responsibility for the social crisis. The party is not really different from the imperialist and pro-business policies of the Labor Party; but it spreads the fiction that Labor can be “pressured” to adopt softer policies if only the Greens have a seat at the cabinet table.
The aim is to imprison young people moving to the left in opposition to the political establishment’s support for Israel’s genocidal war against Gaza and the war on the working class at home.
Shaw’s resignation, however, highlights tensions over the party’s Labor orientation, which has left it out of government despite increasing its vote share at Labour’s expense. The Greens won 11.6% in the 2023 election, up from 7.9% in 2020. Meanwhile, Labor suffered a crushing defeat, with its support almost halving from 50% to 26.9%, largely due to widespread absenteeism in working-class areas.
Shaw recently stated that the party should be prepared to consider a coalition with the right-wing National Party, which currently leads a government with far-right ACT and NZ First. On April 28, Shaw told TVNZ that he would “feel very comfortable” proposing a coalition with National and that he believed many Green Party members would support a Green Party government “to prevent bad things from happening” under a National-ACT-NZ First government arrangement. He repeated these statements on May 8 on Radio NZ.
Shaw also praised corporations, including major polluters such as dairy giant Fonterra and Cadbury, falsely portraying them as making real efforts to address the climate crisis. Shaw found a lucrative job as an operating partner at Morrison, an international infrastructure finance company that reportedly manages $24 billion in “sustainable” investments.
In March, the Greens elected 30-year-old Chlöe Swarbrick as the party’s new co-chair, replacing Shaw. Neither Swarbrick nor any other Green MP has publicly criticized Shaw’s comments, which exposed the party’s pro-capitalist policies.
However, the leadership change was accompanied by other departures.
In January, the party’s foreign affairs spokesman, Golriz Ghahraman, resigned after right-wing broadcaster Newstalk ZB reported that she had been accused of shoplifting. She later pleaded guilty to four charges.
In March, the Greens suspended MP Darleen Tana and launched an investigation into her conduct, citing the news website Things reported that her husband was accused of exploiting migrant workers in his bicycle rental business.
Recently, Green Party spokeswoman on transport Julie Anne Genter was accused of “bullying” political opponents and citizens. On May 7, Speaker of Parliament Gerry Brownlee referred Genter to the Privileges Committee for an investigation into complaints after she shouted at deputy transport minister Matt Doocey during a political debate.
The Greens have denied any connection between these episodes and the leadership change. The National Party-led government and sections of the corporate media have certainly been actively stirring up these scandals. Ghahraman, who comes from an Iranian refugee family, has been targeted by the far right before.
Whatever is behind the move, no one should believe the Green Party’s propaganda that it is moving to the “left.” Swarbrick, a protégé of Shaw and co-leader Marama Davidson, announced her co-leadership bid in February, declaring that the Greens were “the leading left-wing voice in our parliament” and that Labor and National “do not represent the future of this country.”
The pseudo-left International Socialist Organization, which canvassed for the Greens in the last election, sought to give Swarbrick “socialist” credentials, citing her self-described “democratic socialist.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. Swarbrick has worked with some of New Zealand’s most right-wing forces: she entered parliament after the 2017 election, when the Greens joined a coalition government with Labor and NZ First – a right-wing, militaristic and anti-immigrant party with a long history of racist agitation against Asians and Muslims.
There is no fundamental reason why the Green Party should refuse to join a government led by the people that continues and deepens the same program of war and austerity pursued by Labour, the Greens and NZ First.
However, Swarbrick and her pseudo-left cheerleaders are fully aware of growing anger against a government led by the people that is cutting thousands of public sector jobs, cutting funding for school lunch programs, and expanding police, prison and police forces. armed forces.
Greens fear the movement could erupt beyond the control of parliamentary parties; the party is determined that especially young people do not turn to a socialist perspective and fight for the mobilization of the working class against the capitalist system and the entire political establishment.
This was the role Swarbrick and Davidson played when they addressed protest rallies against Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza. On May 8, Davidson again appealed to the government to “use all diplomatic channels to call for a ceasefire.”
This is pure hypocrisy. The Greens were fully prepared to rejoin a Labor-led government, even after Labor justified Israel’s genocidal attack as “self-defense.” The Greens are currently harboring illusions about “diplomacy”, knowing full well that all such appeals are ignored by the Netanyahu regime and its imperialist supporters.
When they were in government, the Greens supported strengthening New Zealand’s alliance with US imperialism, which is a full partner in Israel’s genocide.
In 2022, the Greens supported the government’s alliance with the US and NATO after the imperialist powers provoked the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Shaw has glorified Zelensky’s authoritarian regime, which is overrun by fascists, and told parliament in December: “We must recognize that Ukraine’s response to Russia’s violence will itself involve some violence.”
Shaw praised Kiev for seeking to “minimize harm to civilians” and conducting the war within “civilized” norms. This is a complete fraud. The Zelensky regime is a puppet of US-NATO imperialism that aims to inflict a devastating military defeat on Russia, even at the risk of nuclear war. Hundreds of thousands of young lives have already been sacrificed for this program. Opponents of the war, including socialist Bogdan Syrotiuk, were imprisoned and some were tortured.
In recent weeks, the Green Party and Labor Party have expressed concern about the government’s push to join the AUKUS (Australia, UK, US) military pact, warning it could threaten relations with China, New Zealand’s main trading partner. However, the first Labor-Greens-NZ government welcomed a stronger US military presence in the Pacific region.
As climate change minister, Shaw worked closely with New Zealand Defense Minister Ron Mark to develop a document in 2020 calling for the expansion of the armed forces. The co-chair of the Green Party has presented an “ecological” justification for spending billions on new warships and planes for the air force, absurdly claiming that they are needed to carry out relief efforts after climate disasters in the Pacific.
The real reason, stated by Labor Defense Minister Andrew Little last August, is to equip and prepare the armed forces in case they are “called upon to play a role” in a war in the South China Sea, that is, against China.
The desire to include New Zealand in US war plans is linked to the country’s position as a minor imperialist power in the Pacific, for which New Zealand’s ruling class is dependent on US support. The Greens are calling for greater military focus on the Pacific region and support New Zealand troops joining the Australian-led intervention in East Timor and the Solomon Islands. The party also supported New Zealand’s participation in the criminal US-led war in Afghanistan, falsely portraying it as a “peacekeeping” mission.
The billions of dollars needed to strengthen the military are being taken away from key public services, including health care and education, which were defunded under the Labor-Green government and face further cuts under National.
Workers and young people who are looking for a way to fight genocide, the unfolding world war, the climate crisis and growing social inequality should not be fooled by the Greens’ false “progressive” stance.
Whatever tactical change occurs in the coming months, as the party seeks to distance itself from Labor and the National Party, the Green Party should be judged not by its empty rhetoric, but by its achievements. The key political lessons to be drawn from the experience of the Labor and Green governments are that no recognized party represents the “lesser evil” and that capitalism cannot be reformed but must be overthrown.
The only way forward is to engage in a conscious political struggle against all capitalist parties, as well as the pseudo-left groups and trade union bureaucracy that are trying to chain workers to the Labor and Green parties. This means joining and fighting to build the only truly socialist alternative, the Socialist Equality Group, the New Zealand supporters of the International Committee of the Fourth International.