27 Jan 2011

Main parties pick candidates for Botany by-election

10:58 pm on 27 January 2011

The main political parties have selected their candidates to contest the by-election in the Botany electorate.

The electorate seat in Auckland was vacated by former National MP Pansy Wong, who resigned after admitting her taxpayer-funded parliamentary travel rebate had been misused.

The National Party on Thursday night chose Auckland councillor Jami-Lee Ross, while Labour has confirmed former Finsec national organiser Michael Wood will stand for them.

Maggie Barry, Aaron Bhatnagar, Darron Gedge and Edward Saafi were the other candidates for National.

Other Labour nominees were Roy Bootle and David Collings.

The by-election will be held on 5 March.