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Chumbawamba tells NZ deputy PM Winston Peters to stop using its Tubthumping anthem

Lead guitarist Boff Whalley says band does not share views of Winston Peters, who recently compared co-governance to policies of Nazi Germany

Last week, Peters used the song ahead of his state of the nation speech, where – among other topics – he discussed removing gender and sexuality lessons from the school curriculum and compared co-governance (shared decision-making between Māori and the Crown) to the race-based theories of Nazi Germany. Photograph: Ben Mckay/AAP“[We] would like to remind him that the song was written for and about ordinary people and their resilience, not about rich politicians trying to win votes by courting absurd conspiracy theories and spouting misguided racist ideologies.” Peters did not respond to the Guardian’s request for comment, but in two social media posts on X (formerly Twitter), he said: “The story about the use of the Chumbawamba song has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show how my comments about these sorts of media organisations are correct.”

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