Sentence of the day

Danyl @Dim-Post explains why Phil Goff has ruled out Hone Harawira’s putative new party as a partner:

Presumably Harawira’s proposed policy of putting Phil Goff against a wall and shooting him is a factor here, although of all planks in Harawira’s agenda this is the policy item that would have the widest support amongst non-Maori voters.

Quite. Vernon Small reports that:

However Goff continued to leave the door open to NZ First led by Winston Peters, saying he would wait to see if Peters made it back into Parliament.

He said Peters had stuck with a Labour Government for three years and as Minister of Foreign Affairs he had acted in a way that was compatible with the support agreement.

But not always in a way that was compatible with dignity. I was never more proud of my nephew Simon than when he was at a meeting in Moscow, as one of several NZ residents there rounded up to meet our then Minister of Foreign Affairs, when he told Peters – who was in excessively convivial mode – that he was a disgrace to New Zealand. My nephew is the least censorious of men, and pretty convivial himself, so if he objected to Peters being excessively convivial, he (Peters) must have been royally excessively convivial. 

Phil Goff, who was a good minister of Foreign Affairs, would know exactly how well Peters performed his duties.