When Judith Collins was asked about Police Minister Mark Mitchell’s comment “I don’t know if a gang member wants to deal with a perimenopausal woman”, her look said it all.
Collins turned and eyeballed Mitchell, who grinned, before the Speaker of the House Gerry Brownlee quipped:
“The look would probably do as an answer.”
Collins, who was standing in for absent Minister of Women Nicola Grigg, faced questions in the House from Labour’s Jan Tinetti over Mitchell’s comments, made during an interview with The Platform.
Mitchell was joking with The Platform’s Leah Panapa about recruiting her for the police. Panapa used the term “perimenopausal woman” first, in reference to herself, saying: “You do not need this moody, middle-aged, perimenopausal woman running, right? Actually, you might need me.”
Mitchell replied: “Yeah, well, I don’t know if a gang member wants to deal with a perimenopausal woman.”
Tinetti asked how Collins could be confident women’s issues were being prioritised in light of Mitchell’s comments.
Collins defended Mitchell, saying he was “the strongest advocate against the violence that gangs mete out to women that I have seen, and I fully support him in standing up against the gangs”.
“As for his little statement, I’ll deal with that later.”
Mitchell was seen speaking to Collins briefly before the next question.
Collins was also asked about comments by another colleague, Act’s Simon Court.
Court told a submitter during a Parliamentary Select Committee: “I’m not sure if you’re aware, or if people that you engage with are aware, of the menstrual cup, which is a reusable product available for about $15 from Chemist Warehouse.”
He asked: “Do you think if people knew more about how to access products like that that this concern, this anxiety you have, might be somewhat mitigated?”
In response to Tinetti’s questioning, Collins said: “Do you know, I think it’s amazing, because I don’t need to worry about those sorts of things any more, and I’m just so grateful for the fact that this man is actually interested in it, because I sure as hell am not.”
Things intensified as Tinetti continued quizzing Collins, asking: “How can she have confidence the Government is advocating for women when her colleagues mock perimenopausal women, dismiss the causes for the gender pay gap, appoint an anti-abortion lobbyist as a Minister for Health, and tell women what to put in their vagina and why has she as Minister for Women stood by and done nothing?”
Collins said that was a “stupid question”.
“The last thing we need is for women in this House to be belittling other members of Parliament when they are trying to do their job. Just stand up for women when they ask you to.”
Speaking to reporters outside the House, Collins said Mitchell had told her the comments were “completely out of context”.
“Just because I am a woman and a mother, I am not his mother, and I don’t answer for him. That’s the end of that.”
Tinetti told reporters Mitchell’s comments were “absolutely misogynistic”.
“That’s why they need highlighting, how this Government doesn’t take women’s issues seriously.
“I would say that the look Judith Collins gave Mark Mitchell right at the beginning of that answer is how women feel about this Government.”
Julia Gabel is a Wellington-based political reporter. She joined the Herald in 2020 and has most recently focused on data journalism.