David William Parker (born 1960) is a New Zealand lawyer, businessman and politician who was a Labour Party Member of Parliament from 2002 to 2025.
After a career in law and business, Parker entered Parliament by winning the marginal Otago electorate. He was Attorney-General of New Zealand and a senior Cabinet minister in the Sixth Labour Government between 2017 and 2023, holding the posts of Minister for the Environment, Minister of Transport, Minister for Trade and Export Growth, Minister for Economic Development and Associate Minister of Finance. Parker was also a Cabinet minister in the Fifth Labour Government and a senior figure in the Labour Party opposition between 2008 and 2017, including as deputy leader and interim leader between 2013 and 2014.
Early life and family David Parker was born in Roxburgh to parents Joan (née Pinfold) and Francis Parker. He is the second of four children and grew up in Dunedin, where he attended Otago Boys' High School. He studied law and business at the University of Otago, graduating with a Bachelor of Commerce in accounting and Bachelor of Laws. While still a student, he co-founded the Dunedin Community Law Centre.
Parker has three children with his ex-wife, the poet Sue Wootton. Since 2011, he has had a relationship with Barbara Ward, a sculptor and Labour Party activist. He lives in Auckland and has a holiday home in Karitane.
Professional careers Before entering politics, Parker had a career in law and business. He was admitted as a barrister at the High Court in Dunedin on 1 December 1982. His legal career began with general law followed by some time working as a duty solicitor and working in family and environmental law. He was then a resource management law specialist for the firm Anderson Lloyd, based in Queenstown, and a civil litigation specialist and managing partner for the same firm, based in Dunedin.
Parker's business career began with a Dunedin café, the Percolator, which he co-owned and ran with his wife. His Labour MP colleague Pete Hodgson said Parker's decision to leave legal practice and pursue other activities was because the high charges associated with civil litigation work conflicted with Parker's values. Business ventures with Dunedin property developer Russell Hyslop in the late 1990s, including the restoration of Dunedin's St James Theatre (now the Rialto Cinema), were unsuccessful and led to Hyslop's bankruptcy. In 2006, Parker stated that he, too, had considered voluntarily filing for bankruptcy to "take the easy way out", but did not. He returned to legal practice for three years before resuming his business career.
Parker was hired by entrepreneur Howard Paterson as a business manager for his agri-biotechnology ventures. Parker said one of his early roles was to identify commercial opportunities emerging out of universities and Crown Research Institutes and develop corporate structures for them. Companies Parker was involved with, including as inaugural chief executive, included A2 Corporation, Blis Technologies, Botryzen and Pharmazen.
Fifth Labour Government, 2002–2008
First term, 2002–2005 From about 1999, and spurred by his opposition to then National government's energy reforms, Parker began planning a political career and joined the Labour Party. He was chair of the Dunedin North electorate from 2001 and was selected as Labour candidate in Otago for the 2002 general election. Otago had previously been regarded as a safe National Party seat but was downgraded to marginal when National's support dropped ahead of the election. Ranked an unwinnable 47th place on the party list, and himself not expecting to make it into Parliament, Parker won an upset victory over the incumbent, Gavan Herlihy, by 648 votes.
Parker gave his maiden statement to Parliament on 3 September 2002. In his speech, he addressed infrastructure inaffordability in Queenstown and gave his support to the proposed ability of Queenstown-Lakes District Council to collect a visitor level to fund infrastructure improvements. More than 20 years later, the levy remained only a proposal. Parker's speech also outlined his early views on the economy. He said he supported waste minimisation efforts and suggested that energy consumption and resource depletion should be added to indicators of economic performance, in addition to gross domestic product (GDP). He criticised the governance of the Reserve Bank by Don Brash, who was by then also a first-term MP, saying that the late 1990s "marked the greatest mismanagement of the New Zealand economy" since the days of Sir Robert Muldoon. He further set out his views that the sale of rural land to non-residents should be controlled "very strict[ly]" and that overtime rates should be reintroduced as an incentive for employers to increase employment and decrease the size of the average working week for workers.
Parker's parliamentary roles centred on economic, environmental, and legal portfolios. In his first term, Parker sat on the finance and expenditure committee, the commerce committee, and the regulations review committee. He was promoted in March 2003 to be deputy chair of the local government and environment committee and in February 2005 to be deputy chair of the constitutional arrangements committee.
Second term, 2005–2008 While he was unsuccessful in holding Otago against Jacqui Dean in 2005, it was said that Parker lost by a lesser margin than was expected. He was instead re-elected to Parliament on the Labour Party list.
Parker joined the Clark ministry in its third and final term. He was appointed Attorney-General, Minister of Transport, Minister of Energy, and Minister Responsible for Climate Change Issues on 19 October 2005. Parker's appointment as Attorney-General and "a de facto Minister of Infrastructure" in his second term, despite his Otago election defeat, was criticised by the National Party due to his apparent inexperience. Media commentary on Parker's promotion and early days in his portfolios focused on his status as one of the "few lawyers" within Labour, his apparent close relationships with the prime minister and deputy prime minister, and the perception that he was a "rising star" of the party.
Parker resigned from the Cabinet in March 2006 (see ) but was reappointed with the energy, climate change, and land information portfolios that May. In July 2007 prime minister Helen Clark appointed Parker as the acting Minister for the Environment following the resignation of David Benson-Pope. Parker was promoted to Minister of State Services, and thirteenth in the Cabinet, on 5 November 2007. During this first term as a minister, Parker was praised for his policy formulation and attention to detail, and was proposed by commentators as a possible successor to Michael Cullen as finance minister.
Attorney-General In his first appointment, Parker was Attorney-General for only 152 days, the shortest tenure of any Attorney-General since the 1920s. In his term, he elevated Noel Anderson to the Supreme Court and appointed William Young president of the Court of Appeal.
In March 2006, Investigate magazine published allegations by Russell Hyslop that Parker had filed an incorrect declaration with the Companies Office regarding the property company Queens Park Mews Limited, the directors of which were Parker, Hyslop, and Parker's father. Parker resigned as Attorney-General on 20 March and resigned from Cabinet the next day. Hyslop's charge was that Parker had failed to consult him over the filing as required by law. An inquiry by the Companies Office cleared him of the charge of filing false returns, due to the fact that Hyslop had previously waived that requirement before declaring bankruptcy in 1997, and it was later waived again by the official assignee responsible for Hyslop's affairs after the bankruptcy. Clark described Parker as having pleaded guilty to something he was innocent of and reappointed him to Cabinet as Minister of Energy, Minister for Land Information, and Minister Responsible for Climate Change Issues on 2 May 2006. Political commentator Colin James wrote of the incident: "[it] must be the world’s first resignation by a minister for something he thought he might conceivably have done but turned out not to have... David Parker is one of the few to end 2006 with reputation enhanced."
Other portfolios As energy minister, Parker's priorities were energy supply and competition. Early in his tenure he "ruled out" rolling winter blackouts to manage supply of hydro-generated electricity; however, equipment failures in Auckland led to a significant blackout in 2006. He developed the government's national energy strategy, which was announced in 2007, which had a strong focus on energy sustainability. Power shortages were a persistent trend through Parker's time in the portfolio, with additional gas-generated electricity commissioned to ease demand in 2008. Parker also reiterated New Zealand's commitment to being nuclear free. His proposals to phase out inefficient light bulbs drew criticism of the government's "nanny state" approach, leading Parker to brandish modern energy-efficient bulbs as props during one parliamentary debate.
As climate change minister, Parker announced the cancellation of a proposed carbon tax, pursuant to a coalition agreement between Labour and New Zealand First. In its place, Parker proposed Labour's flagship climate change mitigation policy, the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme, which was legislated as the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading) Amendment Act 2008. For his work in the energy and climate change portfolios, Parker was named 2008 Environmentalist of the Year by The Listener.
In the transport portfolio, Parker opened consultation on possible toll roads in Auckland, described by The New Zealand Herald as the most "courageous" step towards road pricing undertaken in New Zealand. Appointed state services minister in November 2007, Parker immediately came under pressure when it was revealed he, as climate minister, had suggested the environment ministry hire a Labour activist, Clare Curran, as a communications advisor. An investigation by the State Services Commission cleared Parker of charges of inappropriate ministerial direction, although some commentators like the Herald's Fran O'Sullivan and the National Party's Gerry Brownlee were highly critical both of the report's findings as well as of Parker's role and "impatience" in pressuring the environment ministry on a political appointment. As land information minister, he blocked the partial sale of Auckland Airport to the Canada Pension Plan in 2008.
Opposition, 2008–2017 Third term, 2008–2011
Parker was defeated by Dean in the new Waitaki electorate in 2008. He was re-elected to Parliament on the Labour Party list.
Following Labour's defeat in the 2008 general election, Parker was named spokesperson for ACC and electoral reform, shadow attorney-general, and associate spokesperson for finance in the shadow Cabinet of Phil Goff. The conservation portfolio was added to Parker's workload in 2009 and replaced with economic development in 2010. In 2011, ahead of that year's election, Parker was elevated to fourth in the Labour caucus and also assigned the energy portfolio. He led Labour's campaign against the National government's proposed sale of state-owned electricity companies, which resulted in a win at a 2013 referendum but did not prevent any asset sales. He also promoted, for the first time for the Labour Party, a capital gains tax and retirement age increase.
Fourth term, 2011–2014 After the breakdown of his marriage in 2009, Parker moved to Auckland where he unsuccessfully contested the Epsom electorate in 2011. He was instead re-elected to Parliament on the Labour Party list.