The Greens released their delegate list yesterday and Mr Willis will, provisionally, be ranked 16th on his party’s list. The final rankings are yet to be determined and will be framed after party members vote on them.
In the past, provisional rankings have moved around considerably after members have voted.
However, if 16 was Mr Willis’ eventual lot, he would face an uphill battle to make it back to Parliament. He was ranked 12th in 2023 and the final Greens list candidate returned was 14th-ranked Kahurangi Carter.
The Greens achieved a party vote of 11.6% in 2023 and,
with three electorate seats won, returned 15 MPs. On Curia’s rolling average of all public polls, the Greens sit at 11%.
Mr Willis, who will once again be his party’s candidate for the Taieri electorate, was optimistic yesterday.
The initial list of 37 people was a ‘‘highly electable’’ group of people which represented communities across the country, he said.
The news was much better for Dunedin candidate Francisco Hernandez. The former OUSA president missed out in 2023, having been ranked 17th, but became a list MP the following year after the Greens lost several MPs for various reasons.
The delegates list ranking mirrors the widely held perception that Mr Hernandez has been an effective rookie MP and has placed him at 10th.
He is standing in the Dunedin electorate in the November 7 election, and the Greens have announced they will be campaigning to try to win the Labour-held seat.
Mr Hernandez was unable to be reached for comment yesterday.
Ms Carter is now 11th on the rankings, ahead of two newcomers — Cantabrian Craig Pauling and Aucklander Bhen Goodsir. Sitting MP Steve Abel is 14th, ahead of Tania Waikato and then Mr Willis.
Greens list
Green Party delegate list, top 10.—
- Marama Davidson
- Chloe Swarbrick
- Teanau Tuiono
- Tamatha Paul
- Julie Anne Genter
- Hūhana Lyndon
- Lawrence Xu-Nan
- Lan Pham
- Ricardo Menendez March
- Francisco Hernandez
