The Labour Party’s Tāmaki candidate on mortality, Radiohead and being Glen Innes hard.
He wears the stress of the job in his hair, silver curls that are backlit by the sunset over Mission Bay. During an evening at Good George Brewing, everything glows – except for the dark pool of stout in his glass. Nearly a decade ago, his best-selling book, The New Zealand Project, made Max Harris one of New Zealand’s most recognisable young lawyers. Now, after spending most of his adult life in the political orbit, it looks likely the 38-year-old will be adding “MP” to his ever-growing CV at the November election.
When we met for a drink in late June, Harris carried with him a cautious optimism over his campaign to win Tāmaki for the red team. It’s been 69 years since a Labour candidate bagged the east Auckland seat, but recent murmurings suggest Harris could be close to bucking the trend. An apparently leaked electorate poll (no party claimed it as theirs) published by The Daily Blog put Harris at 24%, just a few steps behind leading Act candidate James Christmas at 26%. National’s Mahesh Muralidhar, meanwhile, was at 23% in his self-described “heartland” – a far tighter race than any commentator could have predicted.
He is no stranger to the art of the campaign, having tried to “shape the political debate” without becoming a politician. But after absorbing “a lot of pain from the last couple of years” through working with communities feeling “utterly devalued” by the current coalition, Harris decided the pros of saying yes to running outweighed the cons. He remembers, in the thick of the Treaty Principle Bill debate, while working with claimants in the Waitangi Tribunal, one turned to his peers and remarked, “this process has made everyone older”. “We all just have to find a strategic way to throw ourselves into stopping this,” Harris says. Labour was a natural fit for a man who had joined the party’s University of Auckland branch as student, has worked as an advisor to the UK Labour Party and led the late Efeso Collins’ campaign (endorsed by Labour and the Greens) for the Auckland mayoralty.
For Harris, running has also provided “a chance to fight for Glen Innes” and “reclaim” Tāmaki, better known for its affluent suburbs such as Mission Bay and St Heliers. “It’s also Takaparawhau [Bastion Point], it’s the Michael Joseph Savage Memorial, it’s state housing in Ōrākei,” Harris says. Under new boundary changes, Tāmaki now also holds Point England, an area with a high level of socio-economic deprivation. Despite the vast differences in quality of life experienced across voters, Harris believes “the one thing that ties this whole electorate together is having communities under threat or under strain in different ways in each suburb.”
In Glen Innes, where Harris’s campaign office is based, locals are struggling with the cost of getting to the closest Work and Income office in Ellerslie. In Ōrākei, the power bills are biting. At a recent visit to a retirement village, elderly locals were “anxious” over the “loss of care” in the community. “I think people are concerned about cohesion and community,” Harris says. “In Glen Innes, the cost of living is pulling us apart and putting strain on families in a slightly different way to the board experience [of the electorate].”
Locals took a chance at the last election, ousting longtime local MP Simon O’Connor for Act MP Brooke Van Velden, and Harris hopes the seat could again swing in a new direction. “People have been open to the thought of, ‘we’ve tried the Act Party, could we try something different? Could we try a fresh-faced, sensible alternative?” Even if he loses the race, a comfy list ranking of 29 may still see Harris enter parliament.
It’s been hard yakka juggling community concerns, corner meetings and venue visits, but in general “my life partner says I’m coming home seeming quite happy compared to legal work,” Harris says. In his younger years, the native Wellingtonian (but don’t hold it against him) had pictured a different life for himself. He knows it sounds typical “try-hard” politician talk, but Harris once had a childhood dream of playing cricket for New Zealand. By age 14, that morphed into a desire to be a screenwriter, which came alongside a few bad short films made with his twin brother. Hours spent scrolling Radiohead forums online and a love for writing made him flirt with the idea of music journalism, and somewhere online there still exists an essay penned by Harris on the reflections on the failures of New Labour through Kid A. In many ways, he’s your typical child of the 90s.
Which leads to the next pressing question. If Harris could compare the current government to a Radiohead album, what would it be? “Maybe The Bends, maybe because it feels like everything’s coming up fast,” Harris says. “Or King of Limbs, because it’s droney and uninspiring, and not for everyone.”
At 26, while on an internship in Helen Clark’s office at the United Nations, Harris underwent open heart surgery. Being diagnosed with a mild form of Loeys-Dietz syndrome in his mid-20s forced Harris to confront his own mortality, and maybe its why he feels the pressure to do as much as he can with his life. Harris still keeps “scraps of writing” from his time in hospital, and “at some point in the future”, he hopes to compile those bits together to form another book.
It’s been nearly two hours since Harris and I first found each other in the corner of this bar. It seems time to call it – at this point we’ve spent more time comparing favourite Radiohead tracks and writers than talking policy. My final question of “anything else the public would be surprised to know about you?” gets a simple answer: having flat feet. Stout drowned, he folds his lanky frame to fit through the front door and we wave goodbye as he crosses the road to catch the bus home, silver curls disappearing into the night.
THE SPINOFF PUB Q+A
How much should a pint cost?
I guess it’s about $10-15, but I think it’s too expensive everywhere. We’ve seen in Auckland with Flying Out and Neck of the Woods closing in the last week [great news: Neck of the Woods has since been saved], that the cost of going out directly affects the quality of our social lives as well.
Do you have a karaoke go-to?
‘Torn’ by Natalie Imbruglia. It’s got a great music video as well. Also, Savage Garden’s ‘To The Moon and Back’. That was my first tape. I’m not suggesting it’s high-quality music; I’m a millennial, I’ll own it. I’ve also sometimes sung ‘Bullet with Butterfly Wings’ by Smashing Pumpkins. It’s surprisingly fun.
Favourite place to get a drink in Aotearoa?
I really like Ascot in Wellington. I go down for a lot of court cases, and most of my family are still there. I just like the vibes, I like the outdoor area, I like a little wine, and I’ve had a lot of good nights with friends there.
Which three candidates would be on your pub quiz team?
Vanushi Walters, Tamatha Paul and Winston Peters. I think it would be a good combination of a good shot at winning and a good time. And, you know, it would be an interesting conversation.
Which candidate from across the aisle would you most like to share a drink with?
I thought about two people with this: Chris Penk and Chris Bishop. I know them both a little bit. Chris Penk, I studied law with in some of my smaller classes. He’s always been courteous, respectful and inquisitive, and it would be nice to catch up with him [since this interview, Penk has announced he’ll retire from politics].
I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I did university debating and Chris Bishop was around then. I think he was just finishing uni as I was starting, and he was very senior in the debating community. I think I remember running into him at the cricket when he first got in [to parliament], but I haven’t really talked to him since.
Is there an alcohol-related law you would like to change?
In my legal work, I’ve worked with quite a few people affected by foetal alcohol spectrum disorder. I really think it’s important that we continue to understand that more as a society. I’ve seen a lot of people affected by it – things like gaps in their memory in ways that come across as dishonest. They struggle in courtrooms and there are questions about whether people with FSD, in some circumstances, are fit to stand for trial. I think it’s something that people who work in law and justice are understanding better, and I would be keen to progress a collective understanding of it.
What’s a policy area we’ve been nursing without finishing the glass?
I’m passionate about universalism in policy, and one thing that I think is great about Labour policy that’s been announced so far is its reclaiming of universalism as an ideal. I think that sometimes gets queried by people when we talk about targeting, but I think it’s important to have universal healthcare. If we have all of us – including the middle-class – benefitting from free doctor’s visits, maternity scans or cervical cancer screening, then we’re more willing to defend those [policies].
What qualities make a good drinking partner?
Someone who can talk about life as well as politics and sports.
Have you ever had a Schnapps election moment that made you rethink your political instinct?
I wrote this book in 2017 called The New Zealand Project that I would write differently today. I don’t know if you feel this way, but it’s scary when you put things in print – it’s hard to change them. I can’t think of anything [I would change] off the top of my head and I’m not saying anything in The New Zealand Project was a bad take, but I wrote that book in 2015-16 when I was 26 – you’d hope you’d have a more rounded view [as you get older].
Up next on One Candidate, One Pint: Agnes Loheni, National Party candidate for Waitākere. Read more One Candidate, One Pint interviews here.
