The Green Party’s thoughts and condolences are with people of Vanuatu who have been affected by Cyclone Pam, and believes this must serve as a wakeup call for action on climate change.

New Zealand’s relationships with its Pacific neighbours have been damaged by the latest revelations that the GCSB has been spying on Cabinet Ministers and top level Government officials in the Solomon Islands, the Green Party said today. “Our relationships with Pacific countries are hugely important and the Government now needs to fix the damage it’s done by spying,” said Green Party security and intelligence spokesperson Kennedy Graham. “When it first became known that the GCSB was spying on the Pacific,...

Green Party Co-leader Metiria Turei is inviting John Key to join her for lunch at decile 1 Windley School in Porirua next Wednesday, following the Prime Minister’s offer to undertake such a visit during question time yesterday. “I’m challenging John Key to come face to face with the reality of hunger for some of our kids. When he does, he will find it harder to vote against my Bill to alleviate child hunger in schools,” said Green Party Co-leader Metiria...

The Government’s attempt to change the formula for setting MPs’ salaries could be riddled with embarrassing errors, the Green Party said today.

The Treasury’s announcement today that a deficit for the 2014-15 financial year is likely shows that the Government is failing to meet the key economic target that it set itself, the Green Party said today. “National has always emphasised that achieving a surplus is its number one goal, but it looks like it will fail to achieve that goal and instead we’ll have a $572 million deficit this financial year,” Green Party Co-leader Russel Norman said. “We’re now seeing evidence...

The Government has distanced itself from the Auckland Council decision to allow the destruction of a centuries-old kauri and rimu trees in Titirangi to make way for two houses, the Green Party said today. When asked by Green Party conservation spokesperson Eugenie Sage in Parliament today about the lack of protection afforded to the kauri by the Resource Management Act, Environment Minister Nick Smith said it was up to councils to decide the fate of such trees and he would...

Children in poverty can’t wait for the Budget to bring them enough food, or shoes -  they need urgent Government action in the wake of evidence that one in six kids are going without the basics, the Green Party says. In their latest book, The Child Poverty Debate, Professors Jonathan Boston and Simon Chapple contrast the country’s focus on the needs of older New Zealanders with the poverty crisis facing children, and say one in six kids are suffering from...

The removal of protection for urban trees by the Government is threatening a 500-year-old kauri tree, and is just the thin end of the wedge if the Government is to gut the Resource Management Act (RMA) further, the Green Party said today. “When it’s ok for one of our oldest and most treasured trees to be chopped down to maximise profit, and allowed under the latest changes to the RMA, there’s something very wrong here. Environmental protection in our legislation...

John Key needs to come clean with New Zealanders and explain how it is lawful for the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) to spy, without a warrant, on New Zealand citizens who are part of the governments of the Cook Islands and Niue, said the Green Party today.

Kiwi women will have to wait 120 years, until the year 2134, before they earn as much as their male counterparts, the Green Party said today.