Why Labour’s ex-MP Gaurav Sharma will become a footnote in history

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The removal of Gaurav Sharma from the Labour caucus was the most meaningless divorce between an MP and a party since Alamein Kopu in 1997.

If MP is ready to fight
In principle, the principles should outweigh the difference between the mediation Sharma offered and the workplace management investigation he wanted.

Both require people not interested in the outcome to explore claims and counterclaims for solutions.

The longer Sharma lasted, the more he enjoyed the attention and became less convinced that he had been investigating his case. The reason for today is to give former senior whip Kieran McAnulty a chance to clear his name from Sharma’s allegations.

Sharma lasted longer than Kopu, but her departure from the league and colleague Sandra Lee at Mana Motuhake was equally meaningless, and shares some other similarities with Sharma.

She’s simply not fit for the life of a politician, which sometimes means having to take orders from people in the party you don’t agree with.

One thing’s for sure – Sharma really believed he was being bullied by McAnulty when discussing Sharma’s staff management, and McAnulty really believed he wasn’t. You don’t need to ask to know that much. Mediation is needed to help repair a relationship that has broken down.

When this was rejected by Sharma, who doubled down on his criticism, the dismissal was inevitable and perfectly justified.

Many questioned whether Sharma entered politics with a sense of entitlement. If he did, it was not because of his privileged upbringing. His maiden speech was filled with impressive achievements in school, university, scholarship and medical work, a contrast to his father’s humble origins in New Zealand, where he occasionally slept on the streets and went to great lengths to build roads and roads for his family. drive a taxi.

His son came to parliament with a sense of success, even though he met, among others, a prominent paediatric surgeon who said he bullied him in college and threatened to kill him and ruin his career. Failure is not part of Sharma’s story. He was an accomplished man with strict standards and the right patron in the right place.

Supporters of the gallery’s maiden speech include former Auckland Grammar School principal John Morris and former Governor Sir Anand Satyanand.

Surprisingly, someone like Sharma has clashed with the Whip over employee management. Whiplashes are enforcers, bullies or not, their job is to be bossy.

Surprisingly, Sharma’s colleagues gave him a lifeline last week with a timed suspension and mediation, but he did not have the good judgment to accept it. For him, it was a meaningless decision.

Kopu resigned from her parties less than a year after being elected at No 12 on the Alliance list.

She was in the Opposition at the time, but when her coalition with NZ First collapsed, she switched sides and became a key supporter of Jenny Shipley’s tattered government.

But not all hooligans have shame.

Jim Anderton and Tariana Turia are policy principle hooligans, with Anderton opposing the fourth Labour government’s economic reforms and Turia opposing the fifth Labour government’s response to the Foreshore and Seabed Court rulings. Anderton formed the New Labour Party, then the Coalition. Turia established the Maori Party. Derek Quigley clashed several times with National’s Rob Muldoon over interventionist policies and resigned from cabinet in 1982.

Winston Peters went rogue after being fired by Jim Bolger’s cabinet in 1991 over policy differences and disloyalty, and was expelled from the caucus in 1992. He went on to form New Zealand First.

In 1979, Matiu Rata resigned from Labour after leaving the front row bench. The following year, he went on to form Mana Motuhake.

Morrison Williamson and Chris Carter briefly clashed with their parties, but all because they believed they were being led by the wrong people at the time, Bill English in 2002 and Phil Gove in 2010.

Some MPs have gone rogue because they have the wrong idea of ​​their worth and think they don’t get the recognition they deserve, such as former state MPs Jami-lee Ross and Brian Connell.

Like them, Gaurav Sharma would be a footnote in the history of MPs who went rogue for important causes.