Foreign Minister Murray McCully must be clear whether New Zealand stands to get back any of the $11 million of taxpayer money, which he invested in a Saudi sheep farm, in the event the businessman who owns the farms sells up, the Green Party said today.

The New Zealand Government must dramatically increase its target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions as public demands for change both at home and internationally raise serious questions about inaction on climate, the Green Party said today. Last night, a Dutch court ordered the Dutch Government to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent in the next five years, in order to protect its citizens from climate change. It had been sued by citizens for neglecting to look after its people....

John Key must act today to stand down his Foreign Affairs Minister as the evidence mounts that Murray McCully has mislead both Cabinet and New Zealanders in his bid to further the interests of a Saudi businessman, the Green Party said today. Today the Green Party revealed details in a 2011 letter to Mr McCully showing he had been actively involved in talks with Saudi businessman Hamood Al-Ali Al-Khalaf about the resumption of live sheep transports to Saudi Arabia since...

Child Youth and Family (CYF) investigations into the safety of children should be mandatory in domestic violence cases involving families with children, the Green Party said today. The Greens’ call comes after two high profile judicial decisions this week – the coronial inquiry into the deaths of Bradley and Ellen Livingstone and the verdict in the trial of the West Auckland boys charged with the death of Arun Kumar. “Each of those cases revealed a well-documented history of domestic violence,”...

The Green Party is calling for a stand-alone agency to monitor and provide for prisoners’ health needs. The call for a stand-alone agency comes after a Coroner’s report into the death of a remand prisoner, Jai Davis, at a South Otago jail in 2011.  The Coroner expressed concern that the health of the prisoner was not the main priority of Corrections.  

State houses should be warm and dry, and not require tenants to beg for more help, the Green Party said today. “John Key’s assertion that those in poor quality state housing should ‘reach out for more help’ mocks the fact that 40,000 children are hospitalised each year with respiratory illnesses that their damp, cold housing has helped cause,” said Green Party Co-leader Metiria Turei. “People are reaching out for help, and asking to be transferred out of their mouldy, wet...

The Green Party supports moves by some within National to institute a corporate manslaughter charge in the Health and Safety Reform Bill.   Justice Minister Amy Adams has reportedly brought to Cabinet a suggestion that there be a corporate manslaughter charge included in the Health and Safety Reform Bill. This would mean, for example, that the charge of corporate manslaughter would have been available to those investigating the Pike River tragedy. It could attract substantial penalties and fines.

The National Government should adopt the recommendations of the Lancet Commission on Health and Climate Change, given that the authors say that climate change threatens to unravel the last 50 years of health gains, the Green Party said today. “The National Government needs to stop contributing to the climate change problem and start being part of the solution, in light of the fact that health experts are calling climate change a medical emergency,” said Green Party health spokesperson Kevin Hague. Mr...

More than 8000 people have asked for a moratorium on state-owned enterprise Landcorp’s conversion of Waikato forestry land to dairy farms, in a petition presented to Parliament by Green MP Catherine Delahunty today. “New Zealanders are very concerned about water quality in our country. More than 66% of our rivers aren’t clean enough to swim in, and a big part of the problem is large scale dairy farming. The 8,102 people who signed the petition are saying Landcorp has got...

The New Zealand public deserve to know the full facts behind the Saudi sheep scandal and the only way this will occur is through the Auditor-General investigating the matter, Green Party Co-leader James Shaw said today. The Government has paid $11 million to an influential Saudi businessman to prevent a ‘possible’ lawsuit over a false promise the National Party made to the businessman before they were in Government.