Left-wing and youth members of the Greens embarrassed themselves this year when they overthrew co-leader James Shaw and seized the means of self-destruction.
The overthrow of Shaw in the middle of the year was a shock to all - including the plotters, who hadn’t organised a candidate to replace him. One by one, Chloe Swarbrick, Elizabeth Kerekere and Teanau Tuiono dropped out - the latter pulling his hat out of the ring only after a very funny, very Green, deliberative press conference in which he freely admitted he had very little to say other than that he was pondering whether to run or not.
Pity the leftists in the Greens - coups are meant to be their bread and butter. Lenin, Mao and Ho Chi Minh will be hanging their eerily embalmed heads in shame.
Scandal of the year
Christopher Luxon wins this award for his secret holiday in Hawaii, which took place at the same time as his social media suggested he was visiting Te Puke, provoking a storm of debate about Luxon’s wealth and honesty.
To Luxon’s credit, he took it pretty well, beginning his media round that week with a cheery “aloha”.
He leaned into the joke at the end of the year too. Delivering Christmas presents to the Press Gallery this week, Luxon doled out a box of Hawaiian chocolates (which had been brought back to New Zealand by none other than John Key) and a Te Puke fridge magnet. (Jacinda Ardern delivered gifts later that day - to those interested, she handed out honey made by the bees at Premier House.)
