National MP and farmer Shane Ardern has fired a bit of a broadside at his party, claiming that its farmers have become “lost in action”. During a select committee meeting this week, he took a swipe at fellow National MP Jacqui Dean, asking why her Waitaki seat wasn’t held by a farmer. Dean is a former children’s TV host.
Ardern went so far as to challenge a couple of farmers in attendance at the committee to go back and find someone to replace Dean. Ardern reportedly asked “Who’s the MP now? And why are we absolutely lost in action, absolutely lost in action, as far as MPs in Parliament now are concerned?” Ouch!
Apparently his fellow National MP, the retiring but never shy Sandra Goudie, claimed that farmers had become a “misunderstood minority” within National.
This is an interesting insight into the way National has changed. Farmers used to rule the roost but there has been growing disquiet in recent years that the party has been taken over by financiers and bankers. Interesting to see two of their MPs being so open about it though.
Note: The above comments were reported in a Newsroom story, which is only available if you’re a subscriber.
Why do NZ farmers apparently lean towards National?
Who pays for your Newsroom subscription, Chris?
Let me guess.
Er…
We do?
Your deep insight into the inner machination of the Nats would be interesting, were it not for the fact the phenomena first appeared in the 80′s when the metros outnumbered the rurals and then has continued with the consequent re-drawing of the electoral boundaries to reflect the changing demography.
However, I think many farmers like National because they are self-employed business people and where else are they going to go?
reid @ 5.33
I think farmers like National because it is more conservative than Labour, rather than anything to do with economics.
It is I believe why there was talk of a farmers party not too long ago.
In terms of their takings as business owners they have gotten tax cuts but they also had massive research subsidies taken away which were worth more. National while limiting the effect of it has also upheld the ETS farmers hated and is promising some action on dirty rivers. In terms of social values I don’t think the difference between Labour and National these days are so divergent as far as farmers are concerned.
Farmers are clearly not a dominant part of their caucus any more.
Also are you aware the Labour logo on this site hasn’t been updated yet?
National: Once Were Farmers
Farmers have preferred the right since leasehold land (once Maori land) was handed over to them a hundred years ago. Until 1984 it was the favour of subsidies to farmers/business from National and opposition to protection and subsidy to union workers from Labour – since 1984 it’s been favour for lower tax/smaller government vs higher taxes/larger government.
The unpsoken issue is a CGT and foreign ownership of farms bidding up their value to existing owners. Labour is more likely to bring in a CGT and block foreign ownership of land.
Is there a reason why my posts have gone into moderation since “Trevor stop pretending to be batman” on the boy wonder post?
but they also had massive research subsidies taken away which were worth more
Yes ditching the R&D tax credit was a big mistake on National’s part. They should have expanded it.
I’m surprised Labour haven’t been more vocal on this issue.
It cuts to the heart of National’s base. Everyone in big business gets why it’s required. Not optional but required.
Yet Labour continue not to exploit this gaping opportunity.
@Gary LOL
I’m generalising here but… farmers don’t like, will never accept, outsiders trying to influence what they do and what they think; right or wrong. They pride themselves on their ‘rugged individuality,’ their ‘man against the elements’ and yes, I do mean ‘man’ for all there are many women farming in their own right and even more partnering their men in the business.
They are social conservatives in the main, living in small stable communities, rarely mixing with the outside world of town, new ideas or ‘foreigners’. This is both their strength and their weakness.
Suicide rates, and premature death in all its guises, are high in rural communities; drink driving, accidents with motorbikes and quads, including their own kids, water hazards, guns, livestock, treefelling.
Its their land, animals, trees and waterways, their kids and their lives and no townies, lefties, greenies, academics, women or poofs are going to tell them how to run any of them. End of.
National fits their picture of themselves – ostensibly, though not in reality – the party for the individual going it alone. Pfft. National today is the party of and for big business. The sons and daughters of today’s aging farmers no longer choose or can afford to take over the family farm. Big business or cashed up foreigners are buying them up.
Meanwhile, the rugged individualist, the farmer, is coming to me, a JP, to witness their applications for Community Services Cards. Of course, they may not actually be on the bones of their bums but have Family Trusts protecting their incomes from the IRD and the taxpayers subsidising their man alone lifestyle. I couldn’t possibly say.
It was Fast Forward that offered an opportunity for the farmers to develop their industry base, the R and D tax credits applied to all sectors (National belatedly put something else in their place but it’s less efficient and requires application and approval in advance so bears fruit more slowly).
Yeah well if Labour had any sense they would be hammering the meme of encouraging R&D in private enterprise left, right and centre. How the hell can conservatives argue against the logic of doing that?
I mean, in these straitened times it makes even more sense to do that full on, that it does in normal times.
And this is a chink in their armour through which Labour could talk to big business.
Another chink is depreciation on IT and software projects.
Promise to make that real generous and you will get a lot of business.
Talk of an ‘identity crisis’ in an opposing faction from anyone within the Labour party, as it exists currently, is pretty rich.
Foolish youngling.
As arandar notes the profile of the farm as an owner-operated business is changing – fewer people can afford to buy farms on this basis, existing farmers are not complaining because the system that results in this maximises their farms’s value and thus the untaxed CG when they sell.
Unless someone acts for the farmers of tomorrow and takes us off the foreign owner/foreign debt fueled “farming for the CG” we shall witness the death spiral of the rural sector as we knew it. The concept of “self-reliant” farmers being supported by CSC until they sell up and become multi-millionaires is preposterous. It’s not a sustainable culture and unless we change the rules it will be superceded by company ownership – increasingly foreign owned and run by local managers. The sharemilker “workers’ part of a growing workforce (with the shift to dairying) that will have to look at buying shares in companies to access any ownership in a farm.
So I guess now, with this identity crisis, that Labour will actually campaign in farming areas? The point for National is that whether or not they select farmers as candidates that they will always win those seats, especially when Labour treats the voters with contempt by selecting candidates like Rick Barker
Hone Carters Northland replacement candidate was recently chosen. There was a lengthy selection process involving 10 candidates, with five ballots being required to sort out the final five. In the end the nats passed over a more modern thinking and broadly skilled ‘new generation’ farmer in favour of ex copper Mike Sabin who had shamelessly exploited his police knowledge base to start up a drug consultancy firm-MethCon, (since on sold). MethCon charged small poor communities justifiably worried about P, $1000 per public seminar.
Chris post does have some relevance, the natz are ditching farmers. We are in the era of industrial farming.
A farmer should be MP in waitaki? Hmmm so why the currency dealer as PM?
It’s about representation, advocacy and ability to grasp and understand issues of an electorate. Sorry but you don’t have to have to be a farmer to advocate for them.
Pretty sure the CEO’s of Fonterra never milked a cow in their lives, andif they did it was not for a living.
In 2007 the Statistics New Zealand Agricultural Census showed there were approximately 63,336 farm holdings in New Zealand, irrespective of size or location, with an average of 232 hectares.
Of that 46% are mainly sheep & beef farms, 18% mainly dairy, 1% are mixed livestock and 3% are crop farms. fed farmers
Am wondering if the change to MMP and the change to electoral boundaries also shifted the power of “farmers” within national?