Prime Minister Chris Hipkins at Question Time in Parliament. Photo / Jed Bradley
OPINION:
The self-flagellations of PM Chris Hipkins:
2023 appears to be the year for mea culpas and admissions of stuff-ups. First Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown issued his apology for his early handling of the Auckland floods.
And after starting his time as PM by telling everybody he considered himself a straight-up person who admitted when he got things wrong, PM Chris Hipkins has been falling over himself to prove it.
First he rushed to admit he got his numbers wrong in his answer to David Seymour in Parliament. Clearly he wasn’t convinced that enough people had heard he’d got it wrong, because he was still at it a week later on the Mike Hosking show, when he re-admitted he’d got it wrong - at great length - and said he should have known that Seymour was likely to focus on tax so should have prepared better.
On the same day, he admitted he’d got it wrong when he dismissed as hearsay a report that firearms had been waved at road workers in Hawke’s Bay. He later discovered it was not hearsay at all. So Hipkins apologised for his initial comments, said he’d got that wrong too – and said it was because of incorrect information from the police.
It was rounded out by Police Commissioner Andrew Coster having to apologise for putting Hipkins into a position of having to apologise - after he discovered the correct information had not made it through to Hipkins. The added delight was that National’s police spokesman Mark Mitchell - a long-standing Coster critic - ended up staunchly defending and praising Coster to try to make Hipkins look bad.
Close encounters of the pretend the other one isn’t there kind:
PM Chris Hipkins kicked off his Tuesday with a visit to the opening of a new school in Drury, Ngākōroa School. It was a school he had signed off on as Minister of Education – and returned to open as PM.
His social media post on the occasion did not mention or show one other guest in particular.
Meanwhile, National MP Judith Collins’ Tuesday also kicked off by attending the opening of a new school in Drury, Ngākōroa School. Her social media post did not note the presence of the Prime Minister – but he could be seen in the background of in one of Collins’ photos.
Luxon’s oxygen deprivation comes to an end – he hopes: National Party leader Christopher Luxon has been in danger of getting altitude sickness, due to the lack of oxygen he has been operating under. The change of PMs drowned out his own start to the year. Then the floods and cyclones resulted in him having to cancel his state of the nation speech – and wait for another three weeks to dare have another go. He will have another go this Sunday.
However, he only has himself to blame for the early lack of attention to his Three Waters policy. That was done last Saturday at the Blue Greens conference in Blenheim. Trouble is, nobody told the media a major policy announcement was in the offing until the day before – by which point all suitable flights to Blenheim were booked out. He also chose the one day in the week in which Parliamentary press gallery offices do not usually have anybody rostered on to work. Of course, that was possibly by design.
An uncanny coincidence: On the morning after Rob Campbell was sacked as the chair of Te Whatu Ora – Health NZ for some overly political reckons on that hot-bed of activism, LinkedIn, there was a seminar at Parliament for the Institute of Public Administration NZ. The group offers professional development for those working in the public sector. The seminar was aimed at giving government department and crown entity staff tutelage on how Parliament operates and managing the relationship between the public servants and ministers.
The big banner outside read “helping public service professionals thrive”. Safe to say, Campbell was not the guest speaker – although he may well have been a case study in what not to do.
We love you, Neil Wagner:
The riveting, nail-biting end to the NZ – England test proved quite a distraction for some around Parliament. Minister Michael Wood was on a Zoom call with Treasury officials as things got to the critical phase. He had one eye on the Zoom, the other on the screen with the cricket. Unable to help himself, he let out an unholy whoop of glee and a fist pump when Neil Wagner, the absolute legend, got the final wicket and clinched victory for the Black Caps.
Given Treasury’s main minister, Grant Robertson, is also Sports Minister, the startled Treasury officials might want to take the old saying that sports and politics should never mix literally - and check the sporting schedules before hooking up future briefings.
(This segment may or may not simply have been an opportunity to express our admiration for Wagner the Incredible).