No Deal In Coromandel - Labour Candidate

Labour’s Coromandel candidate Margaret Hawkeswood has ruled out any electoral accomodation in the Coromandel, despite the latest poll showing Labour will need the Greens to form a new government.

The TV3 CM Research Poll showed Labour on 40 per cent, National closing on 36 per cent, the Alliance on eight per cent, ACT on seven per cent, NZ First on three per cent and the Greens on two per cent.

Translated into seats in the House and assuming United’s Peter Dunne wins his Ohariu Belmont seat and the Greens Jeanette Fitzsimons wins the Coromandel seat, Labour and the Alliance would need the Greens to form a majority on the left.

However despite reports that Labour is prepared to reach an accomodation in the Coromandel to ensure a Green victory there, Margaret Hawkeswood says she will not be endorsing Jeanette Fitzsimons at any stage during the campaign and that she is confident of taking the seat herself.

“I will be working for Labour until the end of the day,” she said. “We are not interested in doing any deals with anybody.”

Hawkeswood said she expected a strong swing towards Labour in the seat and in the wider rural communities and was not expecting any direction from her party other than to run a hard campaign until the end.

The Alliance are also unlikely to direct their candidate, Tony Bird, to endorse Fitzsimons.

There has been little independent polling in the Coromandel seat except a poll by Reid Research which was commissioned by the Greens. This poll of 400 people put the Greens’ Jeanette Fitzsimons on 33 percent, National’s Murray McLean on 31 percent, Labour’s Margaret Hawkeswood on 20 percent, New Zealand First’s Robyn McDonald on 10 percent and the Alliance’s Tony Bird on six percent.

Jeanette Fitzsimons has said she doesn’t expect or even want an accomodation in the seat from Labour as she is confident in her ability to win the seat on her own merits.

Hawkeswood is firm that any accomodation will not be coming from Labour, however as the case of National’s Mark Thomas in Wellington Central last election showed, these decisions are not made by the candidates and, in fact, the candidates can be the last to know.

ENDS

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