Barry Soper: Biggest growth industry for this Govt is consultancy

Opinion

It now seems this Government's set up so many inquiries and reviews that they've started reviewing the yet to be started inquiries.

It seems daily another review or inquiry's announced.

As last week drew to a close the Ministers appeared to become restless, it'd been a few days since there'd been a review, so they launched a couple of inquiries.

Unveiling the rebirth of the forestry service, which henceforth will be known as Te Uru Rakau, the self proclaimed first citizen of the provinces Shane Jones announced an independent advisory group to provide industry perspective and advice on his forestry goals, including planting a billion trees over the next ten years.

Jones ceremonially planted the first one just a few weeks back, but he's got to do better than that to reach his target.

That'll require more than 27,000 trees to be imbedded in the ground every single day but they're still scrambling around to find enough ground. It'd take a guru to come up with a perspective on that one.

And then on the same day we had the Local Government Minister Nanaia Mahuta announcing a Productivity Commission inquiry into local government funding.

She figures that rates are rising faster than incomes so simply raising them isn't the answer.

But when Mahuta was the Minister in the Clark Government with the same portfolio she announced a local government inquiry then.

She apparently received 96 recommendations but her opponents say she introduced none of them. Perhaps she should dust off those ideas which would at least save us the expense of another inquiry.

The growth industry with this Government then is clearly consultancy. If you're an expert in any field there's bound to be an opening for you.

Even though Phil Twyford assures us the housing crisis is under control, but there's an advisory group working away behind the scenes to show him how to tackle it.

And at least Winston Peters appears to have saved them the expense of the New Zealand Aid spending review, announced earlier this year, by earmarking more than seven hundred million bucks in aid for the Pacific. Perhaps they should hold an inquiry to review that spend.

After all his cohort Jones has set up a panel to steer him through his three billion buck spend in the provinces over the next three years which is reassuring after the fund was found to be sloshing around when at least one handout was found to be wanting.

So we're looking at tens of millions being doled out over the next 18 months or so on around 80 inquiries and advisory groups which will surely make this one of the most informed Governments of all time.

You can't help thinking the Digital Advisory Group set up by Clare Curran early on is in some ways fitting and is obviously serving her well; how to give the middle digit to her radio broadcasting board and get away with it!