Claire Trevett: King chooses the right words

Labour deputy leader Annette King is beaming as she turns up in Parliament. In her hands she has the verdict of Grey Power on its first meetings with the new National Government ministers.

The post-mortem by president Les Howard on the March visit has handed King a wonderful arsenal.

She first reads out his rendition of bumping into ACC Minister Nick Smith, who had not responded to their requests to meet.

"His face reddened, and with his head down the moment the lift arrived at the ground floor he took to his heels and was last seen hurrying away in the distance."

Yesterday, Bill English has the misfortune to be filling in for Prime Minister John Key. He summons up a response along the lines of Grey Power being grey by name but colourful by nature and language.

There is far worse ahead for him. King moves on to Grey Power's meeting with Social Development Minister Paula Bennett, who, they said, had first of all failed to follow up on promises to contact the group, then "never arrived" at a meeting set up by English, and finally met them at the last minute only after English's office intervened once more.

King, obligingly, shares their verdict of that hard-won meeting as one that "left a sour taste in our mouths as we felt we had received the old-fashioned 'brush-off'."

It went on, saying Bennett needed to "shape up to her obligations", before ending, "It appears she thinks a loud laugh will solve all questions put to her and this meeting was a complete waste of her time. Well, it certainly was a waste of ours."

At this, Bennett emits a loud laugh. But English could only answer feebly that the new Government was "straightforward" and did not waste lobbyists' time, "unlike the previous Government, who agreed with them in the room, promised the world and then did nothing about it when they left".

It doesn't pay to laugh in the face of Grey Power - let alone at a time when many of its members remain in mourning for the loss of Winston Peters from Parliament.

How Labour's benches howled as King sought leave to table the Grey Power Lobby Report and was given it. But, mischievously, she tabled only the excerpts about Smith and Bennett, rather than the full report.

Had English read the full report, he would have had a happier time. Grey Power described him as "very pleasant", and Senior Citizens Minister John Carter as "one who can be trusted to get things done, rather than just talk about what needs to be done".

But the real killer English needed to take the wind out of King's sails came in their verdict of the PM: "I found John Key much easier to talk to than the previous Prime Minister".