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Green MP Eugenie Sage (left) and her successor in the party’s battle for the Banks Peninsula seat Lan Pham, a former councillor with Environment Canterbury. The pair were joined by Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick, right, in Christchurch’s Victoria Sq on Monday for the launch of Pham’s candidacy.
Former Environment Canterbury councillor Lan Pham will contest the Banks Peninsula electorate for the Green Party at this year’s general election.
She said she was “absolutely thrilled” to have been selected to represent the Greens when the country goes to the polls on October 14.
The Banks Peninsula electorate includes Lyttelton and Akaroa, as well as Halswell, Ferrymead and Sumner in Christchurch.
The seat is currently held by the Labour Party’s Tracey McLellan, who won in 2020.
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“Banks Peninsula includes so many of the places my family and I live, work and play including southern Christchurch city and the Port Hills,” Pham said.
“I really want to thank the Green Party and everyone for their support and encouragement to take this on.”
Pham spent six years on the regional council and said it had made several “significant achievements” during her time, including opposing deep sea oil and gas drilling off the Canterbury coast, being the first council in New Zealand to declare a climate emergency, and the introduction of $1 and $2 bus fares for all of Greater Christchurch.
ALDEN WILLIAMS/Stuff
Pham addressed the crowd at the School Strike 4 Climate march in Christchurch in 2021.
Her background is in freshwater ecology in both public service and grassroots conservation and restoration, including “working with papatipu rūnanga, farmers, schools, and community groups across Canterbury and the lower South Island”, she said.
Her ancestry is Vietnamese and Pākehā. She has a long connection to Banks Peninsula through her great-great-grandmother, who arrived in Lyttelton in 1876 and lived the rest of her life in Akaroa.
Pham hit headlines in 2017 when she made a spoof music video – based on Taylor Swift’s hit song Bad Blood – to highlight New Zealand’s “freshwater crisis”.
KAI SCHWOERER/Stuff
Pham, a freshwater ecologist who spent six years on the Canterbury regional council, will fight for a seat currently held by Labour’s Tracey McLellan.
According to the 2018 census, the Banks Peninsula electorate has a population of just over 71,000. It has a lower than average percentage of people in their 20s and 30s, but a higher than average percentage of those in their 40s, 50s and 60s.
Pham will take over from Green candidate Eugenie Sage, who has contested the electorate since 2014.
“It’s a huge honour and challenge to follow Eugenie Sage who has made such an incredible contribution as a Green Party MP especially in conservation and waste minimisation,” Pham said.
MARTIN DE RUYTER/STUFF
Eugenie Sage, then minister of conservation, at the East Matakitaki Hut in Nelson Lakes National Park. (First published in September 2020)
“My hope is I can play a key part in being part of a strong, credible Green Party team who understands that we are part of the environment and we only thrive when nature thrives.”
Sage announced in December that she would step down at this year’s election.
It had been an “enormous privilege” being “a voice for nature and a fair society” for over a decade in Parliament, she said at the time.
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