Bryce Edwards
Political Analyst in Residence, director of the Democracy Project, School of Government, Victoria University of Wellington
Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal?
For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to first suspend Darleen Tana from her small business portfolio six weeks ago, and then [last week] to suspend her from their caucus while an independent investigation is made into her links with alleged migrant exploitation.
The announcement of the latest suspension came out [last week], following on from investigative journalist Steve Kilgallon looking into the MP’s relationship with E-Bikes NZ, and their employment of immigrant worker Santiago Latour Palma, who claims to have been exploited. You can read [the] breaking story here: Green MP suspended amid migration exploitation claims, and the follow-up full story that has much more detail here: The bike shop, the Green MP, and alleged migrant exploitation.
The e-bike company was set up a decade ago by Green MP Darleen Tana and her husband, Christian Hoff-Nielsen. But before going into politics in 2019, Tana relinquished her shareholding and directorship of the company. However, Palma, the worker from Argentina, claims that Tana was involved in his employment last year and that she is still closely connected to the business operations.
He alleges that Tana oversaw his employment at the e-bike company, during which he was paid under the table, but then owed about $25,000 in wages and holiday pay. He has taken his claim against the business to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA), and mediation is scheduled.
In Kilgallon’s astonishing investigative story above, it’s alleged that the Green MP was responsible for hiring the migrant worker without a visa and then paying cash under the table. The article reports Palma’s allegations about the Green MP running the bike business: “He says Tana was present at the Waiheke store much more than Hoff-Nielsen, he witnessed her paying employees in cash, and when Hoff-Nielsen went on an extended holiday, she oversaw operations.”
Palma also claims that he volunteered on Tana’s Green Party election campaign in 2023, helping with online IT work. He has supplied evidence of this in terms of personal messages from Tana about the campaign work. In general, it seems that Palma has a lot of documentary evidence to back up his claims of exploitation and wrongdoing by his employers.
Tana’s husband, Christian Hoff-Nielsen, has been interviewed […] by the Herald, and he strongly denies it all, stating “This is not a news story, there is no news” – see the Herald’s Green Party MP Darleen Tana suspended amid migrant exploitation allegations.
Furthermore, the Herald reports: “Hoff-Nielsen said he had not spoken to the worker ‘at all’ and had worked for him for ‘mere months… He’s just pumping it up,’ he said, insinuating the claims are a cash grab. He said being stood down has been ‘really hard’ on Tana. ‘She’s not here and she’s got nothing to do with this,’ Hoff-Nielsen said.”
Tana’s disclosures to the Green Party
The Greens have announced today that they have employed an independent investigator, barrister Rachel Burt, to clarify the issue. However, the party has known about the problems since early last month.
It was on 1 February that Tana disclosed that a complaint had been made to the ERA about her husband’s business including allegations about herself. It was at this point that she was suspended from being the Green spokesperson on small businesses. Then on 9 February she disclosed to the party that a second complaint to the ERA had been laid.
Newstalk ZB reports this morning that Tana “was suspended after it became apparent that she may have previously been aware of the allegations.” The Greens say the investigation will therefore clarify “fully what Ms Tana knew, and when”. And she has been suspended, the Greens say, because the party regards the alleged activities as “a conflict of interest with her small business portfolio” – see: ‘Deeply serious allegations’: Green MP steps down amid migrant exploitation investigation.
New co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick was interviewed [last week] by Mike Hosking, in which she was unwilling to shed much light on what had occurred, arguing that “it was not useful for politicians to involve their opinions in the situation while an investigation is ongoing”. More interestingly, in the interview, she refused to say whether Tana has denied the allegations or not. She did however call the situation “incredibly serious” and say that it involved “deeply serious allegations”.
Green Party secrecy and integrity
The Green Party is defending its decision to keep the original suspension of Tana under wraps. They say they didn’t want to influence the ERA mediation process by going public. Furthermore, co-leader Marama Davidson has said […] that the party didn’t take the issue more seriously because it wasn’t aware of the extent of the allegations or how much Tana knew about them.
The party has also admitted that it was only the media inquiries of journalist Steve Kilgallon that made them investigate the exploitation allegations more seriously. Davidson told the media […] that after Kilgallon approached them [last week] they acted: “It became clearer that we needed to investigate whether there may have been some prior knowledge from Darleen to the allegations… And [that’s] when we felt, to get to the bottom of that, an investigator being brought in to ascertain what involvement there has been and what was known” – see Anna Whyte’s article in the Post: Media inquiries shake Green Party confidence in suspended MP Darleen Tana.
Davidson has explained that prior to the media providing further information, the Greens had decided to take their MP at her word about the migrant exploitation allegations and not investigate further. She says that the Greens came to this conclusion, after relying on “good faith conversations”. Davidson says meant they “were confident that a mediation to resolve matters was appropriate and that there was no prior knowledge or involvement about the allegations for Darlene herself”.
Will this wash with the public? Certainly, rightwing commentator Trish Sherson thinks their justification for the secrecy is “nonsense” – see Newshub’s Darleen Tana: Political commentator Trish Sherson says Green Party’s handling of allegations ‘nonsense’.
Sherson says the Greens’ credibility is now heavily damaged: “The big problem for the Greens is the gap between standing an MP down from their portfolio on February 1, saying nothing publicly and now coming out six weeks later and saying, ‘We’ve taken this terribly seriously’.”
Tana’s background involvement in her husband’s business
In defending the party and Tana’s actions, Davidson has stressed that their MP wasn’t closely connected to the eCycles business under scrutiny, saying that the MP “was not a director or shareholder of the small business”. The MP first stood for the Greens in 2020, and the Greens emphasise that “Tana has not been a director or shareholder of E Cycles NZ since 2019.”
Interestingly, Tana’s own LinkedIn profile says that she was employed full-time as the Chief Operations Officer of eCycles NZ for nearly eight years, “Feb 2014–Nov 2021”. In addition, she was also listed as a director of a different company, Bikes U Like Ltd, until after last year’s election when this was removed from the companies register.
The e-bike business was established soon after the couple moved to Waiheke Island in 2013. It quickly expanded, opening stories [in] Queenstown, Newmarket and Devonport. In 2020, during the pandemic, the business was saved by the Government’s Wage Subsidy Scheme, but the company went public saying they needed greater financial help.
Tana herself started her own consultancy company, Moemoea Inc, which she also wound up on her election to parliament.
Tana’s personal and political background
The Greens will be questioning its candidate recruitment processes. It has made a real effort in recent years to diversify its caucus and bring in more corporate and telegenic MPs. But in doing so, there’s arguably been a problem with quality control. Tana is the third Green MP in less than a year to have a major scandal over their personal integrity.
Tana herself doesn’t come from a political background. As she explained in her maiden speech to parliament, her recruitment into the Greens only came after a chance encounter with the Northland branch of the Green Party at Waitangi.
For a profile on Tana’s candidacy at the 2020 election, see the Herald article by Jenny Ling: A mini-tour of Kawakawa with Darleen Tana Hoff-Nielsen (paywalled).
In this, Tana – who at this stage also used her married name of Tana Hoff-Nielsen – takes a reporter on a trip on her e-bike around a town in the electorate she was standing in, although she reportedly had to drive her bike to the appointment with the journalist.
Prior to this, Tana hadn’t been an activist with the Greens. Instead, she was a high-flying corporate businesswoman. She had spent 17 years working for telecommunications companies in Europe – which is where she met her husband.
Major integrity damage for the Greens
The Herald’s Audrey Young asks […]: “Who would have guessed that the Greens would be plunged into a series of crises, and so soon after posting their best election result ever?”
Certainly, it’s striking that it’s the third major integrity scandal for the party in less than a year – following on from Elizabeth Kerekere quitting the party last year over bullying allegations, and then Golriz Ghahraman quitting over shoplifting. […] Davidson told the media that the party was “going through some times”.
It seems that the Greens’ traditional reputation for strong integrity is now destroyed. This third integrity scandal of Tana’s will haunt the party for a long time.
There will be questions about the party’s integrity in terms of management of the scandal, too. Often, it’s the cover-up that is perceived to be worse than the original wrongdoing. There’s a growing sense that the Greens have become less open and more like traditional parties in their attempt to suppress information about wrongdoing within their own ranks. It’s twice now that MPs have been secretly suspended, and the party’s own supporters will have lost some of their trust in the leadership’s openness.
The Greens have long traded on their reputation for integrity. And they have certainly been quick to point to the integrity lapse of other politicians. And even over the last six weeks, while Tana was suspended from being the spokesperson on small business, she was still campaigning against the government on issues of integrity. On X, for example, most of Tana’s posts have been critiques of the government’s integrity. On Luxon’s claiming an accommodation allowance, she posted: “Oh! I see what he did there! RUDE!!!!! That’s just cooked.” On the Government’s changes to tobacco rules, she labelled them “Beyond contemptible”.
Damage to the Greens’ pro-worker reputation
Perhaps it’s the migrant exploitation angle that will do the most damage to Tana and the Greens. The party used to be especially strong on migrant exploitation, and indeed they have campaigned and won votes on the basis that they would take such exploitation most seriously and fight against it. It will therefore be shocking to some that the party will be seen as trying to hush up alleged migrant exploitation by its very own politicians.
But the latest scandal just goes to illustrate how far the Green Party has moved away from its union and working-class orientation. It’s hard to imagine that in the days of Sue Bradford, Keith Locke or Catherine Delahunty that allegations of migrant exploitation would occur within the Green caucus. Previously it was the Greens standing up for such employees rather than being part of the alleged exploitation.
To some degree this just reflects that the party has changed in recent years, becoming more associated with pro-business perspectives. In fact, it seems that Tana was promoted to a high list position with the Greens precisely because of her strong corporate background.
Can Tana survive this scandal? Previously she has campaigned on the need to stamp out exploitation. In last year’s campaign she said: “Putting profit before people and the planet simply has to stop.” She was right, but if over the next few days she’s deemed to have put her own family’s profits before people, she might find that this is exactly why she will need to go from either parliament or the Greens.