Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern during a post-Cabinet press conference. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern during a post-Cabinet press conference. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Opinion
As we say goodbye to 2021 and welcome in 2022, it's a good time to catch up on the very best of the Herald columnists we enjoyed reading over the last 12 months. From politics to sport, from business to entertainment and lifestyle, these are the voices and views ouraudience loved the most. Today it's the top five from Fran O'Sullivan.
Businesses need less podium performance and more facts - August 21
Jacinda Ardern gave the appearance of relishing her podium performances rather too much as she yesterday delayed announcing that Auckland's level 4 lockdown will be extended by at least one week.
I've written before about Ardern's irritating habit of failing to "just get to the point, Prime Minister" when she indulges in lengthy preambles prior to making the only announcement that the country really wants to hear in these Covid press conferences: "What level of lockdown are we in and for how long?" and "how many cases are we today?" etc.
As a business colleague noted to me yesterday, the PM's communications approach seems to have been modelled on those annoying "click through" questions that crop up on social media where, for instance, you might be invited to look at movie actor Sam Neill's mansion and would have to click "next" multiple times first, meantime being swarmed by advertisements.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern during a post-Cabinet press conference with director general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Just answer the question Jacinda - June 26
It's now very difficult for the Prime Minister to turn around and kick ass over the haphazard Covid vaccine rollout when she has backed herself into a corner over the OECD's decision to award New Zealand bottom ranking on this score.
But that is exactly what she needs to do.
In other words, adopt the Helen Clark approach of "I've had a gutsful and I'm going to fix this".
Jacinda Ardern is an adept spinmeister, but NZ needs results, argues Fran O'Sullivan. Photo / Mark Mitchell
PM honoured abroad, less so at home - May 15
Reading Fortune magazine's tribute to Jacinda Ardern yesterday, I was reminded of the Biblical saying, "no man is a prophet in their own land".
At the very time Ardern's leadership has been lauded by Fortune, which put her at the top spot on its 2021 list of the world's greatest leaders, the Prime Minister is working hard to maintain her credibility with the business community.
Ardern is usually sure-footed. She has a great political nose and an even greater nose for PR — including her own.
But just days out from Grant Robertson's May 20 Budget, her Government over-reached when it came to its plan to impose what was widely — and in Cabinet Ministers' views inaccurately — interpreted as a public service pay freeze.
Jacinda Ardern and Grant Robertson at BusinessNZ's pre-Budget lunch. Photo / Dean Purcell
Please, just show us the Covid plan - July 10
Advice released from this week from a five-person advisory group headed by Sir Brian Roche makes painful reading.
The Roche team's review of the February Covid outbreak found a lack of coherence among central agencies, conflicting messaging that could undermine public confidence, and a Government that had failed to learn the lessons of past reviews.
Jacinda Ardern's own Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet — which is central to the co-ordination of a "whole of Government" approach to the Covid-19 pandemic — clearly needed to lift its game.
My question is, why leave Sir Brian as an adviser? Why not put him in charge of the Covid-19 response with a clear prescription to "get stuff done" instead of reporting to ministers who sit on his reports for another couple of months before releasing them?
Sir Brian Roche (pictured in 2013) should be given the power to get things done, argues Fran O'Sullivan. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Judith Collins is flailing - September 4
Judith Collins is inching herself ever closer to the political leadership death zone with a series of ill-considered and intemperate performances.
Collins embarrassed herself when she over-reacted to firm — but on-point — questions on TVNZ's Breakfast show over her decision to leave level 4 lockdown and fly down to Parliament in Wellington for a session that would have better served democracy if all MPs could have joined a Zoom meeting — not just a handful of MPs thundering away in an virtually empty debating Chamber.
Democracy was hardly under attack as the National Leader intimated.
Yes, the Prime Minister had played some politics. Surprise. But holding a virtual Parliament is little different to holding a company AGM on Zoom, or a body corporate one for that matter, such as the one I attended on Tuesday.
