\n The former defence minister was the belle of the ball at Winston Peters\u2019 public meeting in Masterton with a steady stream
\n of attendees coming to greet Mark, who was standing outside the meeting room, welcoming people wearing his trademark cowboy hat and impeccably polished black shoes.\n <\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t surprising Mark received such a warm welcome, given his presence in the Wairarapa, where he will be standing against incumbent National MP Mike Butterick and Labour\u2019s Kieran McAnulty. <\/p>\n
He\u2019ll face an uphill battle to win the seat, having finished third to the National and Labour candidates in three previous elections. <\/p>\n
Even Mark himself is realistic about his chances, battling through a hoarse, flu-affected voice to tell the Herald the electorate\u2019s \u201ctribal\u201d voters could see a \u201cblue ribbon around a dead dog and call it Bill and they\u2019d vote for it\u201d. <\/p>\n
But like NZ First\u2019s other former MP candidates, Mark\u2019s value lies not in his reputation in his electorate but in his reputation and experience as a former minister. <\/p>\n
The embarrassing resignation of Stuart Nash was also a loss of an experienced minister who isn\u2019t foreign to the complexities of Cabinet. <\/p>\n
Former NZ First minister Ron Mark greets people alongside current NZF minister Casey Costello ahead of the party’s Masterton public meeting. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
It was also the loss of a former MP with significant name recognition who had sought to ingratiate himself with members by appearing at the party\u2019s conference as a guest speaker to test what were initially very warm waters. <\/p>\n
Mark ticks both those boxes as a well-known figure, both within the party and nationally, and will bring a level of experience to what is expected to be a much larger NZ First caucus next term. <\/p>\n
Mark has been long-rumoured to be returning to his former party and has done his best to temper any speculation. Speaking to the Herald last week, Mark went so far as to say every day gave him a new reason to not return to politics, talking up the prospect of a lucrative job in Luxembourg advocating for Ukraine in its war with Russia (Mark says this job is still on the table despite his decision to run). <\/p>\n
While it had been unclear how close Mark was with Peters, a clear signal was given when Mark joined Peters\u2019 table at the NZ First party convention in Auckland last month. <\/p>\n
What remains to be seen is what role Mark plays in a future government if current polls showing a re-elected coalition come to bear. <\/p>\n
Ron Mark at the NZ First convention last month. Photo \/ Sylvie Whinray <\/p>\n
Mark, who had formerly served with the New Zealand Army and the Sultan of Oman\u2019s Special Force, last week told the Herald the roles of Defence Minister and Veterans Minister would be the \u201conly job I\u2019d want\u201d. <\/p>\n
Whether Mark could reclaim the defence portfolio might not be as straightforward as he might hope. <\/p>\n
Current minister Chris Penk, who served with both New Zealand\u2019s and Australia\u2019s navies, is considered one of the more competent National ministers, taking over the portfolio from Judith Collins. <\/p>\n
Penk is understood to have great passion for defence and wouldn\u2019t give up the chance of having a full term with the portfolio lightly. <\/p>\n
It is also one of the few areas where National has been considered the chief authority compared to other parties in Parliament (although the most recent Ipsos Issues Monitor found National and Labour were equally considered most capable of dealing with defence\/foreign affairs issues). <\/p>\n
However, there is a chance Penk may become a victim of his own success. Should NZ First double its vote share and National lose several of its senior ministers as is currently predicted, Penk may be forced to give up defence due to an insistent NZ First and a National leader in need of a capable minister working in other areas. <\/p>\n
Peters, who will have learned a lesson from publicly promising Nash a spot in Cabinet, will likely keep his cards close to his chest as far as what ministerial portfolios his party will be gunning for in any future coalition negotiations. <\/p>\n
NZ First leader Winston Peters addresses the crowd in Masterton at his public meeting. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
Masterton offered a friendly welcome not just to Mark but also to Peters, who benefited from a supportive crowd of about 250 people at the Copthorne Hotel. <\/p>\n
Peters arrived in a boisterous mood, perfect for a crowd hoping to witness the NZ First leader\u2019s typically combative style of delivery. <\/p>\n
He visited his usual touchpoints: railing against the Government\u2019s \u201cdisgrace\u201d of a Covid inquiry, condemning the former Labour-led Government\u2019s actions during the pandemic and Parliament occupation which he likened to a \u201cNazi, fascist shutdown\u201d, and declared he would never accept a knighthood because of the \u201cclowns\u201d who had been given one. <\/p>\n
It featured the party\u2019s new policy of an annual, tax-free $5000 grant for parents to help with costs from their first three children for the first three years of their life, totalling $45,000. <\/p>\n
The policy requires one parent to be a New Zealand citizen, aligning it with other policies directly focused on the citizen\/non-citizen distinction, which appears to be central to the party\u2019s campaign with an immigration policy still to be announced in the coming weeks. <\/p>\n
The hour-long speech wasn\u2019t without a few stumbles. One notable misspeak was trying to land a hit on Labour leader Chris Hipkins but introducing him as the leader of National and then Act, before briefly forgetting his name and referring to him as \u201cgingerbread boy\u201d. <\/p>\n
There weren\u2019t many veiled references to Christopher Luxon, which tend to feature in speeches from both Peters and his deputy leader Shane Jones. <\/p>\n
There were comments about how the country couldn\u2019t afford \u201cweak leadership\u201d and a nod to \u201ctweedledum and tweedledee\u201d (read Luxon and Hipkins). Asked afterwards by media for his view of Luxon saying businesses could be the child in a parent-child relationship with the Government, Peters responded: \u201cWell, in some cases the other way around.\u201d<\/p>\n
NZ First leader Winston Peters holds a media standup after his public meeting in Masterton. Photo \/ Adam Pearse<\/p>\n
Like previous meetings, Peters\u2019 declaration his party would remove New Zealand from the Paris climate accord received the largest applause and even a standing ovation from some in the audience. <\/p>\n
Mainstream media received a bollocking right throughout Peters speech, more so than normal which is saying something given the NZ First leader often relies on a crowd\u2019s derision of journalists to earn laughs and jeers. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s likely Peters feels aggrieved about media commentary of his party in the last two weeks, which has been filled with stories about Shane Jones\u2019 \u201ccrass\u201d comments about Luxon\u2019s welcome of Indian PM Narendra Modi, Nash\u2019s comments about National MP Katie Nimon and Peters\u2019 own attack on Green MP Lawrence Xu-Nan. <\/p>\n
Peters\u2019 words had their expected effect as one woman, upon seeing Peters walk away from his media standup, accused journalists of being \u201cf****** devils\u201d. Another man encouraged journalists to \u201cgo get another jab\u201d. <\/p>\n
If Peters needed an example of how political rhetoric can result in real-world hate, he need only look at those who celebrated as a dummy with a picture of his face was put through a mock guillotine in Auckland yesterday. <\/p>\n
Adam Pearse is the Deputy Political Editor and part of the NZ Herald\u2019s Press Gallery team based at Parliament in Wellington. He has worked for NZME since 2018, reporting for the Northern Advocate in Whang\u0101rei and the Herald in Auckland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The former defence minister was the belle of the ball at Winston Peters\u2019 public meeting in Masterton with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9980,3278,154959,1888,22528,78,32573,273224,111,43,139,69,9981,238412,6723,223],"class_list":["post-555960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-adam","tag-facts","tag-fills","tag-first","tag-hole","tag-in","tag-mark","tag-nashshaped","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-pearse","tag-ron","tag-stuart","tag-the"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}