Prebble's list focus hobbles Hide plans

By FRANCESCA MOLD

Rodney Hide's hopes of winning backing from his Act colleagues for his tilt at the Epsom seat have been weakened by leader Richard Prebble's decision not to compete for his old Wellington Central seat.

Mr Prebble said yesterday he had accepted his party's call for him to campaign nationally for list votes rather than fight for the territory he lost to Labour's Marian Hobbs by 1400 votes last time.

The party wanted Mr Prebble to concentrate on promoting its zero tolerance of crime policy, which it believed would strike a strong chord with voters.

"I looked at the commitment required to run for Wellington Central and the commitment to have a truth-in-sentencing, zero-tolerance campaign and one or other had to go," he said.

The decision is evidence of the intense pressure within the party for all candidates to concentrate on winning list rather than electorate votes.

Act claims it can win enough party votes to put 20 list MPs in Parliament.

Mr Prebble said Epsom was an important seat for Act because in 1996 it got more than 20 per cent of the party vote.

But at the last election that vote dipped to about 16 per cent.

The drop was put down to Mr Hide's campaign for the Epsom electorate vote.

Act has been polling in Epsom to determine Mr Hide's chance of toppling the sitting MP, National's Richard Worth, who won last time by fewer than 2000 votes.

A decision is likely within weeks.

"I've made no secret of the fact that in my own view Act would be better off campaigning on the party list," Mr Prebble said yesterday.

"But when I look at Epsom, if the poll shows that Act could win it, we would be foolish not to run for it."

But New Zealand First leader Winston Peters predicted Mr Hide would be "shafted" by Mr Prebble.

"After the Fiji incident, the garden-voucher incident and the taxi-chit incident, Prebble will have great relish in stopping his candidacy," he said.

Mr Hide said he agreed with the push for list votes.

But, if Epsom voters wanted a contest and polls showed he had a good chance, he would be keen to stand.

Mr Hide may have a greater chance of convincing his party to let him stand if its polls support him.

He can also argue that traditionally centre-right Epsom differs substantially from Wellington Central where Act polls found a centre-left majority of 60 per cent.

Act's president Catherine Judd said it was possible Mr Hide would be allowed to go for the electorate vote.

"We're looking at what is in the best interests of the party," she said.

Mr Prebble said a high-profile candidate would stand for Act in Wellington Central. But he would not name the person because nominations had not closed.

However, winning the seat would be a "hard ask" for Act's candidate. Act's polling showed that Labour's Marian Hobbs was well ahead in the Wellington Central race. The polls had put him [Mr Prebble] second and National's Hekia Parata third.

"It shows that the present MP is going to get elected purely because she belongs to the Labour party," Mr Prebble said.

"In terms of her actual support from the electorate for the job that she's done, she doesn't get a very good mark. In fact, if I was her I'd be ashamed."