The Hound at the time saw an unholy alliance between MIE and NZ First and the two groups’ failure to overturn the Silver Fern Farms and Shanghai Maling merger. Now, a couple of months out from the election, NZ First has announced its list of Winston Peters’ nondescript yes-men candidates – as usual – and who should pop up on this list but one Mark Patterson, the former MIE deputy chair. Winny’s lot has also named a couple of other ‘leading lights in the agriculture sector’ as candidates, but the Hound has never heard of them and is guessing they will remain just as anonymous after the election.
