KEY POINTS:
Helen Clark's rejuvenation plans for the Labour Party hit a snag with 63-year-old list MP Russell Fairbrother mustering enough local support in Napier to block 40-year-old challenger Stuart Nash for nomination.
But the Prime Minister yesterday hinted that Mr Nash might receive a high list place.
Mr Fairbrother had won the selection "fair and square" but he would concentrate on winning the electorate and was not nominating for the list, she said.
"Mr Nash will seek a position on the list. He is a very credible candidate and one who the Labour Party will certainly be seeing a lot more of."
Mr Fairbrother, a former criminal barrister, and considered a leftist, lost the Napier seat in 2005 and many in the party thought he would retire next election.
But he maintained local support and had the support of Labour's affiliated unions.
Mr Nash, who stood in Epsom in the last election, is thought to have received high-level encouragement to seek the Napier nomination.
He was believed to have earlier considered the Rimutaka selection, to be vacated by retiring MP Paul Swain, but backed off when Andrew Little, general secretary of the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union, was pencilled in for it.
Mr Little then decided against standing, by which time Mr Nash had committed himself to the Napier contest.
He resigned his job as a strategic adviser at the Auckland University of Technology and moved his family to Napier.
