Andrew Little

Andrew James Little (born 7 May 1965) is a New Zealand lawyer, former politician and former trade union official.

Born in New Plymouth on 7 May 1965, Little was educated at New Plymouth Boys' High School.

His father was a devout National Party supporter and Little recalls delivering National pamphlets under his father's direction when he was younger.

When he was 17, Little got his first job as a labourer digging the main cable trench for a new methanol plant in Waitara Valley as part of the "Think Big" project.

During his time there he noticed that the contractor he was working for was deliberately using a less than adequate amount of concrete than the work required.

In the 1980s Little studied law, philosophy and public policy at Victoria University of Wellington, where he became active in the campaign against New Zealand's student loan scheme.

He finished work there at the beginning of 1984 and left upon being accepted to enter university.

He had also worked as a timber yard worker and in security.

He was elected president of the Victoria University of Wellington Students' Association and later served as New Zealand Union of Students' Associations (NZUSA) president in 1988 and 1989.

After graduating Little took a job as a lawyer with the Engineers' Union (a forerunner of the EPMU), with his work including Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and employment law issues.

In 1997 he was appointed the union's general counsel (chief lawyer).

Two years later, he was appointed assistant national secretary, and was elected national secretary when Rex Jones stood down from the position in 2000.

In 2007 Little was ranked at number 40 on the New Zealand Listener Power List.

Little became an important extra-parliamentary figure within the Labour Party and was one of the main advisors from the trade unions.

Little was a representative on Labour's national council as Affiliates Vice-President, responsible for liaison between the Labour Party and affiliated trade unions.

The bill is modelled on the United Kingdom's Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007.

At the time, Little stated the bill was needed because "the track record of prosecutions under the Health and Safety Act is that they tend to focus on lower level failures because getting the evidence and securing the conviction are easier, but personal responsibility for fatalities goes unchecked."

On 2 March 2009 it was announced that Little was elected unopposed as President of the New Zealand Labour Party.

The Crimes (Corporate Manslaughter) Amendment Bill was drafted in the wake of the 2010 Pike River Mine disaster and the CTV Building collapse during the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.

Little was first elected as a Labour Party list MP in 2011, after serving as President of the Labour Party between 2009 and 2011.

His political career followed a career in unionism, which included 11 years as the national secretary of the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union, New Zealand's largest union.

He held that post until 2 April 2011.

Little stood for Parliament in the 2011 general election.

Despite a loss in the New Plymouth electorate to the National Party incumbent Jonathan Young, he was elected as a list MP owing to his ranking of 15 on the Labour Party list.

This was the highest rank given to a Labour candidate who was not an incumbent MP.

He took on the ACC shadow portfolio and gained profile during the National Party's restructuring of the organisation.

Together with Trevor Mallard, he launched attacks against ACC Minister Judith Collins, who eventually responded with issuing a defamation claim in May 2012.

The affair resulted in the resignations of the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) chairman John Judge, and the ACC chief executive Ralph Stewart.

In December 2012, Collins settled her defamation case against Little and Mallard following a hearing at the Auckland High Court.

A 2012 3News poll found that seventy-four percent of respondents would like to see a charge of corporate manslaughter introduced.

In December 2013, Little introduced a member's bill in the ballot that, if passed, would create a new criminal offence of corporate manslaughter.

He was Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition from 2014 to 2017 and a senior minister in the Labour governments led by Jacinda Ardern and Chris Hipkins from 2017 to 2023, including as Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations, Minister of Justice, Minister of Health and Minister of Defence.

At the 2014 election he again stood and lost in the New Plymouth electorate.

Young was returned with a much increased margin, but this was partially explained by boundary changes.

Little was elected as list MP because of his ranking of 11 on the Labour Party list.

Following Labour's defeat at the general election in September 2014, David Cunliffe resigned as leader of the Labour Party.

Little's term as Labour leader was characterised by low opinion polling results and punctuated by his resignation from the role less than two months before he was due to lead the party in the 2017 general election.

Little's decision was described as "selfless" and instrumental in Labour's success under new leader Jacinda Ardern; in the following six years he served as a senior minister and was regarded as a "safe pair of hands" across twelve ministerial portfolios.

On 17 October 2023, following the Labour Government's defeat in the 2023 election, Little announced he would decline to return to Parliament as a list MP and that he intended to return to legal practice.

The Bill was eventually transferred to the name of David Cunliffe but was not drawn before Cunliffe's retirement from Parliament in early 2017.