It is also not beyond the bounds of possibility that once Parker has decompressed, the Government will want to use his abilities, his brain and his judgment in a role in which he can be of bipartisan service to the country.
Labour leader Chris Hipkins hinted at that in his press statement when he said, “I am certain his contribution to New Zealand is not over.”
It is not likely to be a diplomatic posting, but the Hon David Parker is New Zealand First’s favourite Labour MP, and there are any number of roles he could serve in, be it with a financial, environmental or legal bent.
Parker could have been Finance Minister, and he could have been the Finance Minister that promoted a capital gains tax at the 2023 election.
One of his biggest regrets may be in rejecting an offer made by Andrew Little when Little became the Labour Party leader after the 2014 election.
Parker had gone into the election as deputy leader (to David Cunliffe) and as a nerdy finance spokesman.
He hadn’t set the world on fire. The current account deficit was his great passion and he failed to get voters excited about it. Nor a capital gains tax. It was the last time Labour campaigned on a capital gains tax.
When Cunliffe resigned after the election, Parker then stood for the leadership, along with Grant Robertson and Nanaia Mahuta.
Parker had gone into the contest saying it was all or nothing, that he would not serve as anybody else’s finance spokesman.
When Little won, he graciously offered Parker the finance job again. But Parker turned it down, and so it went to the second-placed leadership candidate Grant Robertson, who three years later became the Minister of Finance.
Parker, however, made his mark in other portfolios, not least in Inland Revenue in which he got officials to report on the inequities of the tax system. He could not persuade Hipkins to back a wealth tax or capital gains tax going into the 2023 election and resigned his Revenue portfolio.
It has been a point of bitterness within Labour since then, and in some pockets of the party has turned Parker into a “principled martyr” of the Left and Hipkins into a “power-driven villain” on the Right.
There is less friction now, however, because Parker has effectively won. The issue of tax reform has been settled – the only question, besides how to sell it, is whether to go again for a CGT or to run with a wealth tax.
As a minister, he took pride in his work to lift the levels of swimmability of New Zealand rivers but got nowhere in settling the vexed issue of freshwater management.
His huge project as Environment Minister over six years was rewriting the Resource Management Act, but it took so long that National was able to repeal it soon after it took office in 2023.
He can leave with the satisfaction of having got Labour to a happy and settled place in terms of New Zealand’s place in the world and where it should sit in these tumultuous times. He delivered a thoroughly well-argued speech on the subject last week.
The one area in which Parker will be less obviously missed within Labour has been on Treaty of Waitangi policy.
He has brought a more moderate voice to the table behind the scenes than the Māori caucus would always want and was always listened to, having the perspective of a former Attorney-General. There is no one in the caucus to replace that experience and gravitas.
In a previous era, he may have been expected to go home to put his feet up after 23 years in politics and reaching the age of 65 this year. But Parker still has much to offer.
Audrey Young covers politics as the New Zealand Herald’s senior political correspondent. She was named Political Journalist of the Year at the Voyager Media Awards in 2023, 2020 and 2018. She was political editor from 2003 to 2021.
