Greens abandon Clark to United

By VERNON SMALL

The Greens will not back a Labour-led Government on key confidence and supply votes, leaving Helen Clark dependent on Peter Dunne's untested United Future.

At one stage yesterday, the Greens threatened to publicly announce that talks with Labour had broken down. But the threat was put on hold after a late-morning meeting between the Prime Minister and Green co-leaders.

It appears that the Greens were persuaded to hold off in the interests of long-term relations with Labour. They are likely to make an announcement today.

Helen Clark is expected to unveil a three-year deal with United Future today or tomorrow that will ensure her minority Government can survive confidence motions.

Since the July 27 election, she has tried to win support from both the Greens and United Future, but the Greens refused to budge on the GM moratorium.

As Green co-leaders Jeanette Fitzsimons and Rod Donald started a morning meeting with Labour leaders, sources said they would tell Helen Clark talks were at an end and they would not support her on confidence and money supply votes, even for the 15 months until the GM moratorium was lifted.

The party was furious that details of the talks had been leaked to journalists and that no significant concessions had been offered in return for its backing.

The Greens told Labour they could not support a centre-right Government.

A press conference was planned for half an hour after the talks, heading off Helen Clark's announcement of the outcome.

"At least this way we will preserve our dignity," a Green source said.

But when Ms Fitzsimons and Mr Donald emerged after a 50-minute meeting with Helen Clark and her deputy, Michael Cullen, the press briefing was canned.

Instead, the Greens said officials would continue to talk.

However, sources later said there had not been a change of heart, but the two sides had stepped back from the brink in the hope of preserving long-term relations.

In earlier talks, Labour had said its "bottom line" was that the moratorium on commercial release of genetically modified organisms would end in October next year.

The Greens have themselves set a bottom line over the issue, saying they will vote against any Government which lifts the moratorium.

Helen Clark wants to ensure that the moratorium is lifted before the 2005 election so GM does not become a perpetual election issue.

As a compromise, Labour had offered to put it to a vote in the House, which would pass easily but which the Greens could vote against.

As an alternative, Labour offered to tighten the regulatory regime on the release of GM organisms.

Both offers were rejected.

United Future, which is in parallel talks, is being tipped as the front-runner to support a Labour-led minority Government.

But Labour would probably need Green backing for many social and environmental policies.

The Labour left and key union backers are wary of the conservative moral stance of many of United Future's nine MPs and have questioned the voting record of its leader, Mr Dunne.

In the last Parliament he voted against many worker-friendly measures and opposed the Government on all confidence and Budget measures.

Business is suspicious of the Greens and favours a deal with United Future.

After yesterday's meeting, the Greens said the talks were going well.

"We had a constructive and friendly meeting with Helen Clark and Michael Cullen ... and everything is on track. We are looking forward to a resolution before the week is out and look forward to a co-operative relationship," Mr Donald said.

No further talks had been scheduled between MPs.

Mr Dunne held talks with Labour for an hour yesterday and said progress was satisfactory. There would be further talks today.

He was also hopeful of a resolution this week.

Beehive sources said he had been offered the prospect of a Cabinet seat in 2005 when Speaker Jonathan Hunt is expected to go to London as High Commissioner.

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