新西兰英语 314 MP Chris Carter

　　The Labour MP Chris Carter is in trouble today. He wrote a letter which he handed to some reporters. The letter said that he believed Phil Goff, who is the Leader of the Opposition¹, does not have a chance to win the next election. He believed that another Labour Party MP should replace Phil Goff as leader. Chris Carter did not say who should be the new leader.
Chris Carter did not sign the letter. It was anonymous². However, he addressed each envelope in his own handwriting so it was easy to guess who had written the letter.
Phil Goff was angry and called a meeting of the caucus³ which is all Labour MPs. The caucus voted unanimously to expel Chris Carter. This means all members of the caucus voted the same way.
The Labour Party Council will meet on August 7th and will decide if he can stay in the Labour Party or not. If he is expelled from the Labour Party, Chris Carter will then have two choices. He can stay in Parliament as an Independent MP or he can resign from Parliament. If he resigns, there will be a special election called a by-election.
Chris Carter was one of the Ministers from the last Labour government who used his credit card to buy personal things. He also travelled a lot, and Phil Goff suggested that maybe he travelled too much, at a cost to the tax payer. Listen to Minister’s Credit Cards on June 20th (13th) 2010.
It is possible Chris Carter was thinking of how Julia Gillard replaced Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister of Australia. Listen to June 26th 2010 for more about Australia’s new PM.
Questions
1. Is it likely that other Labour MPs will support Chris Carter in the next few weeks?
2. Chris Carter believes very strongly in the Labour Party. Why might the Council want to expel him from the Labour Party?
3. Was an anonymous letter to reporters a good way to attack Phil Goff?

1 opposition   

n.反对，敌对

参考例句：

• The party leader is facing opposition in his own backyard.该党领袖在自己的党內遇到了反对。
• The police tried to break down the prisoner's opposition.警察设法制住了那个囚犯的反抗。

2 anonymous   

adj.无名的；匿名的；无特色的

参考例句：

• Sending anonymous letters is a cowardly act.寄匿名信是懦夫的行为。
• The author wishes to remain anonymous.作者希望姓名不公开。

3 caucus   

n.秘密会议；干部会议；v.（参加）干部开会议

参考例句：

• This multi-staged caucus takes several months.这个多级会议常常历时好几个月。
• It kept the Democratic caucus from fragmenting.它也使得民主党的核心小组避免了土崩瓦解的危险。