As the two hours slipped by, he seemed to get more relaxed, leaning back in his chair more and more, taking it easy. I wondered if the Coke Zero hadn’t kicked in, or maybe he was just tired, or maybe he’s just given up.
I mean don’t get me wrong, I thought he came across well, I think relaxed is good. But I was interested to hear what he backs about his government, and what he was less proud of. MIQ, the debt still owed to them over that and their handling of how to manage that, he thinks they could’ve done that better or differently.
As an Aucklander who felt like they got locked down for way too long I can tell you from where I sit, I’d have liked to think he would have felt they could have handled that better. He didn’t mention any regrets around slow procurement of PPE or RAT tests or locking Kiwis out of their own country for so long, or having the borders shut seemingly forever, but he did think they could've managed the costs owed for MIQ better. He still doesn’t know how much money is owed from that, interestingly. But he does back his government’s approach to crime, co-governance, and management of the economy.
He puts a lot of the criticism of his government’s performance down to international headwinds or global pressures, doesn’t take much responsibility for what their part in it all has been. But when asked if he backed his Foreign Minister, Nanaia Mahuta, he said he did. Now her appointment was odd from the get-go.
She was a Jacinda appointment that left people scratching their heads, she had no background in foreign affairs whatsoever, she didn’t like travel, she hadn’t held senior roles at cabinet level before... it didn’t make a lot of sense. She also yesterday put her foot in it when she didn’t condemn the attacks on Israel. While other international leaders condemned them, she described it as ‘an outbreak of violence between Israel and Gaza...’ and called for ‘an immediate end to all violence.’
Now alongside being so embarrassing that the PM and leader of the opposition had to jump in immediately and correct that statement, it also got picked up by overseas media. Sky News Australia reported that she failed to condemn the attack. Nicola Willis, who we had on the show yesterday, said Mahuta’s statement was so weak, that Christopher Luxon had to speak up and condemn the attacks on Israel, followed by the PM.
So does the PM feel Mahuta is out of her depth as Foreign Minister or does he support her? Well he told Mike yesterday he supports her and thinks she’s doing a great job, although he said he thought her words ‘could have been stronger’. But here’s the weird thing, she didn’t even run that statement past him, they didn’t even talk before it went out. Hence he had to put out another one straight after it. But he backs her on the international stage, said he has absolute confidence in her. Which I think helps explain why his party is so often accused of not reading the room.
If you think that’s an acceptable offering from your foreign minister, and you don't even want to pick up a phone to each other beforehand, then you’re probably not aware of how low the bar has sunk.
Kate Hawkesby is a journalist and broadcaster who hosts the Early Edition show on Newstalk ZB.
6 comments:
One thing about maori is that when not being artfully cunning and devious, they can be refreshingly straight talkers. As a member of a race who aspires to decolonise NZ and of which some activists claim(ed) the colonists are only visitors, she naturally identifies with the Palestiniane and hence the moderate comment. If Hipkins was surprised then he is even more out of touch with where his govt is (soon was) taking us than I surmised.
Something is up. He is not acting like someone who is about to be sacked. Can we trust our voting system? I hope so.
Perhaps knowing he's almost certain to lose is finally a weight off his shoulders.
You know what it's like. You stress and worry about something for ages until you reach a point where you say, screw it, there's nothing more I can do. Then you feel better.
Either that, or he smoked some dope to chill out, man!
He didn't start giggling when Mike asked him if he had faith in Mahuta, did he? Then it's definitely the dope.
One of the after effects of covid is fatigue. Maybe he has chronic fatigue syndrome which Big Pharma hasn't got real cures for. However, taking natural supplements of anti -oxidants would help that. Oops, I forgot ,they are going yo be strictly regulated by this government
I agree with Anonymous above.
I have already heard of some dodgy stuff going on in rest homes, missing parties on the party list voting form, electorate voting forms in the wrong electorate, no ID being required to sign up to vote at the polling booth.
It all screams out that voting should be done on the one day only, supervised by properly trained personal with all checks and balances in place. You know, like it was back in the day.
I for one no longer trust our voting system.
Like it was back in the day? Really? I was heavily involved in an election campaign running the first openly gay political candidate in NZ (Dr Ian Scott). This was the Eden electorate in 1981, running against Aussie Malcolm who was a cabinet member in the Muldoon Government. The electorate had many rest homes and special votes were collected by party members, not electoral officers as they are today. We had a good number of reports of rest home residents being told by National party members who had gone into the rest home with special voting forms to "just put the tick by Aussie's name dear". Dr Scott lost the seat by 114 votes, it's easy to surmise that had the corruption practiced by those special vote collectors been prevented, the result could have been different. No matter what your political belief, free and fair elections are the cornerstone of our democracy. BTW I think it was shortly thereafter that electoral officers were tasked with collecting the special votes from rest homes as recently happened at my wife's rest home. All the checks and balances are the same irregardless of whether you vote early or on the day, "Anonymous" needs to recognise that the "I don't trust...." is out of the playbook of those who are working very hard to undermine our democratic system for their own autocratic ends.
Post a Comment