Four political hopefuls vying to be Southland's next MP outlined their goals and aspirations for the region at a 'Meet the Candidates' meeting in Lumsden last night. 

David Kennedy from the Green Party, Jon Mitchell from Labour, National candidate Joseph Mooney and Joel Rowlands from The Opportunities Party addressed an audience of about 30.

The two-hour meeting was held in the Lumsden Senior Citizens Hall and began with a round of introductions from the candidates followed by an hour-long question and answer round where each candidate had one-minute each to answer questions from the public. 

Candidates were asked questions on a variety of topics, such as how they would vote on the upcoming cannabis and euthanasia referendums, if they would re-open the birthing unit at Lumsden, their position on the recent Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill and their stances on reducing fossil fuels. 

National candidate Mr Mooney said in his personal view he was for medicinal marijuana use but was undecided on euthanasia. He then said the new tenancy bill was well-meaning but poorly thought through and would ultimately cause more harm than good. 

All candidates agreed that the storage of the toxic ouvea premix around Southland and mainly Mataura needed to be removed as soon as possible. 

Mr Mooney was appointed as the National Candidate for Southland under two weeks ago, taking the position after Clutha-Southland MP Hamish Walker's decision not to seek re-election. He previously worked as a senior trial lawyer in Queenstown and said if elected he would be committed to stimulating the economy post-COVID to ensure future generations would grow up in a thriving economy. 

"We're going to go into hard times because of the pandemic... I don't want kids to experience what I experienced as a kid."

Green candidate Mr Kennedy is a retired teacher and is thoroughly involved in the local community. He holds several governance roles including chairing the committee for the Southern Farmers’ Market and helping lead the development of a transitional museum and art gallery.

He said he was committed to creating a sustainable future and tackling social and environmental issues in Southland such as the state housing shortage, child poverty, income disparity, climate change. 

"This election should be about electing a government that will focus on developing a sustainable economy that allows our people and nature to thrive post-COVID," he said. 

The Opportunities Party candidate, Mr Rowlands battled through public speaking nerves to deliver a powerful speech about why he is running for the Southland seat. Having lived in social housing himself, raising a young family and losing his mother to suicide he said more needed to be done to address social, housing, economic and health issues in Southland.

"I'm passionate about helping small businesses... and I'm against growth for growth's sake."

Included in TOP's main policies was introducing a 'Universal Basic Income' or UBI where all adults would be paid $250 a week and children $40. 

Labour candidate, Mr Mitchell has a strong background in disaster management. He is the deputy director of Response + Recovery Aotearoa New Zealand, Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu and subject matter specialists, that delivers disaster response and recovery leadership development programmes on behalf of the government. He also has three degrees.

He said Southland needed strong leadership after being somewhat forgotten about. He said he was passionate about advocating for better education, training, and employment opportunities to stimulate local growth as well as improving local maternity services. 

One member of the public, Patricia Boyer travelled from Gore to hear the candidates speak in person and said it was interesting to hear what they had to say, although her opinion on who she would vote for hadn't be swayed by any of the other speakers. 

The question and answer rounds mostly ran smoothly, with outbursts from the crowd kept to a minimum, until a question around asset taxes were asked.

The question was "Do you think that the asset tax proposed by the Greens is fair and equitable?".

Mr Mitchell declined to answer saying "I'm not here to talk about the policies of the other parties so I won't comment."

Mr Mooney said more tax was not the answer to growing the economy. 

Mr Kennedy said ultimately the tax was aimed at combating the growing divide between rich and poor.

"The economy should benefit people," he said

"Some people grow grotesquely wealthy," he said

To which a member of the crowd scoffed saying that was a load of rubbish. 

Earlier in the meeting, Mr Kennedy said Southland earned 30% of the country’s export income from only 3% of the population, and yet the median income in Southland was only $32,000.

"Income disparity is growing in this country and that needs to be reversed," he said.