Matt McCarten: Green Party must choose between one of two sides in post-election strategy

Hands up all those who believe the Green Party can get themselves out of the Labour Party's shadow and become open to a coalition deal with National. No takers? I didn't think so.

The media beat-up of this announcement by the Green Party leaders from last weekend's Greens conference didn't rattle Helen Clark or get a response from Don Brash. While the issue didn't raise more than an eyebrow from observers it indicates that the Greens are reviewing their present electoral strategy that assumes the party's natural home is on the political left and, therefore, a natural Labour ally.

The election campaign for Rod Donald's replacement as co-leader gave the Greens the platform to unleash their pent-up resentment in being left out of government. Donald was convinced the Greens were deliberately shafted by Labour and felt personally betrayed.

To be fair to Labour, they had little choice after both NZ First and United Future refused to support a government if the Greens were in it. Though the support of the Maori and Progressive parties would have given a one-seat majority to a Labour-Green government, Helen Clark wasn't going to allow herself to be at the mercy of Tariana Turia.

However, what was personally galling for Donald and the rest of the Greens was that Labour not only bribed Winston Peters with all the baubles of office he wanted, but that they then gave Peter Dunne a cabinet post even though Labour didn't need United Future's vote to govern.

As the term of this Government has advanced it is becoming more obvious how impotent the Greens have become. Jeanette Fitzsimons dryly observed in her co-leader's speech that Labour seemed determined to govern with its enemies rather than with friends. She merely articulated the electoral obvious. Of course, Labour takes the Greens for granted. The Greens have nowhere else to go.

The Greens have got themselves into the same place on the left as Act has on the right. Both are at the mercy of their supposed natural coalition partner, who can treat them like dirt and get away with it.

After the Maori Party was snubbed by Labour as a potential coalition partner they agreed to meet National to consider their electoral options. Of course, there was a hue and cry about this unprincipled manoeuvre. I was one of the critics, but you can understand the reasons for it. Since then the Maori Party has adopted it as a conscious strategy. As one Maori MP told me with a conspiratorial wink since they left their electoral options open they have been treated very respectfully by both major parties.

This has not been lost on Green strategists. All four candidates for the male co-leader's role ran their campaigns on a platform of putting more distance between their party and Labour. Russel Norman was always going to romp home once it became known that he had the support of Fitzsimons and the rest of the parliamentary caucus. It wasn't the contest between the candidates that was interesting, but that they all questioned their role with Labour. More revealing was that they questioned whether the Greens should be left-wing.

The main contender to Norman's coronation, Nandor Tanczos, led a strong anti-left message. I presumed he adopted this platform to give him a point of difference over Norman who has strong left-wing credentials. After all, Tanczos has been a reliable ally for left-wing causes. The other two contenders took a similar stance - obviously reflecting a rightward shift in the Green Party.

I suppose the clincher that the Greens really are committed to being "neither left nor right" was in the speeches of both Norman and Fitzsimons at their conference, and reinforced in their public statements this week.

Both focused their attention on environment and transport issues. Both addresses read like an academic dissertation on the environment. This isn't surprising as both are academics. But what was noticeable was neither of them even mentioned the day-to-day struggle of most New Zealanders. No mention of the increasing gap between the haves and have-nots; no mention of increasing and concentrated attacks on workers. In fact, the touchstones of the left, such as equality, social justice and universality of social services, weren't even referred to.

Instead we got Fitzsimons arguing that the way forward was huge user-pay taxes and levies on energy sources. To me, this is the real change in the Greens. Just who do the Greens think these user-pay flat taxes will hurt? The multinational corporations who own the energy supplies will pass it on to consumers and continue reaping more profit. Spiking petrol prices even more won't help the worker who has to drive to work. Transport needs to be cheaper, not more expensive. Of course we need to put money into public transport. But instead of punishing people who have to travel by car it would be better to encourage people on to public transport by subsidising it and making it free. Doing this in Auckland would be far cheaper than building the roads proposed anyway.

The downgrading of social justice issues by the Greens, and Norman's reported comments indicating that the National Party would be a coalition partner if they were prepared to address the consequences of climate change, are disturbing. I don't really think they will walk away from the causes of injustice or join a National government. But it does indicate a new mood and opportunism in the Greens.

The Greens shouldn't ignore reality. There really are only two sides. You can't have it both ways.