How many times had Michael Wood been asked by the Cabinet Office to sell his Auckland Airport shares?
We had thought six times was bad but it turned out to be 12.
In a day of questions that saw the Government as decimated as any day I have seen watching these things, Paul Goldsmith of National asked Wood whether it was dishonesty or incompetence.
Wood, who looked ghost-like, didn't really answer. He didn’t have to.
ACT, in a series of questions designed to embarrass, gave examples of whether or not people entering various processes involving Governments and Government departments could be assured that the people they were dealing with didn’t have a conflict of interest. Especially if the Prime Minister couldn’t trust his own minister to not have a conflict of interest.
Grant Robertson, as Labour's point man on rules around questions, tried valiantly to stop it, but couldn't.
He also failed yesterday to get the speaker to rule against Mark Mitchell asking Ginny Andersen if we feel safe from crime, the way she has been claiming.
What matters in Question Time is twofold.
First, it occasionally elicits stuff the Government don’t want you to know, with yesterday being one of those days.
Secondly, when it does do that, it provides the Opposition i.e National and ACT, with momentum.
It's not always made public because the press gallery is such a shadow of its former self and the lack of experience means a lot of this stuff never gets recognised, far less covered.
But it has been many a year, and I have seen a lot of years, since I have seen a Government as badly on the mat as this one was yesterday.
Chris Hipkins has inherited the Wood scenario, providing proof, yet again, that his predecessor was barely interested in any detail at all, far less the sticky bits.
You want to look at a picture of what a dead man walking looks like? You had your choice. Look at Hipkins at about 2:10pm yesterday. If Wood looked justifiably sick, Hipkins was punch drunk, barely conscious and desperate for the bell to end the round.
I would have thought it goes without saying, but Wood can't survive this. Because this now goes to Hipkins' leadership.
It's one thing for Ardern to be useless and hands off, but this is now on him.
12 times.
Five-year-olds don't get asked 12 times to do something. No one ever, for anything, has been asked 12 times.
Records in incompetence, or skulduggery, are being set here.
Even though Hipkins has literally no one in his empty cupboard of ministerial talent left, he can't ignore this any longer.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings.
Wood, who looked ghost-like, didn't really answer. He didn’t have to.
ACT, in a series of questions designed to embarrass, gave examples of whether or not people entering various processes involving Governments and Government departments could be assured that the people they were dealing with didn’t have a conflict of interest. Especially if the Prime Minister couldn’t trust his own minister to not have a conflict of interest.
Grant Robertson, as Labour's point man on rules around questions, tried valiantly to stop it, but couldn't.
He also failed yesterday to get the speaker to rule against Mark Mitchell asking Ginny Andersen if we feel safe from crime, the way she has been claiming.
What matters in Question Time is twofold.
First, it occasionally elicits stuff the Government don’t want you to know, with yesterday being one of those days.
Secondly, when it does do that, it provides the Opposition i.e National and ACT, with momentum.
It's not always made public because the press gallery is such a shadow of its former self and the lack of experience means a lot of this stuff never gets recognised, far less covered.
But it has been many a year, and I have seen a lot of years, since I have seen a Government as badly on the mat as this one was yesterday.
Chris Hipkins has inherited the Wood scenario, providing proof, yet again, that his predecessor was barely interested in any detail at all, far less the sticky bits.
You want to look at a picture of what a dead man walking looks like? You had your choice. Look at Hipkins at about 2:10pm yesterday. If Wood looked justifiably sick, Hipkins was punch drunk, barely conscious and desperate for the bell to end the round.
I would have thought it goes without saying, but Wood can't survive this. Because this now goes to Hipkins' leadership.
It's one thing for Ardern to be useless and hands off, but this is now on him.
12 times.
Five-year-olds don't get asked 12 times to do something. No one ever, for anything, has been asked 12 times.
Records in incompetence, or skulduggery, are being set here.
Even though Hipkins has literally no one in his empty cupboard of ministerial talent left, he can't ignore this any longer.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings.
4 comments:
The queston is whether or not people entering various employment in Governments and Government departments would be sacked if they too were asked 12 times to do a simple task that any simpleton could do?
The answer is yes. If they were also as corrupt they would have the police onto them too....
Wood has to be gone. Enough said Mr. Hipkins.
Old Mother Hubbard eh? No bloody good "empty cupboard of ministerial talent".
How many more ministers can they afford to lose before we need an election to get an effective government? Minister of everything, McAnulty the weasel, surely can't actually be the minister for everything. I hope the newly minted Dame is squirming at the shambles she left in her trail of destruction. But she was so aspirational she knows no shame. Dam the Dame!
MC
Empty Cupboard? Another good reason to be rid of MMP.
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