Things turned out differently and last Thursday our paths crossed briefly outside that same café. He was chipper and ebullient, clutching a book by Rory Stewart and just as chatty as I’ve known him to be. He knew, and I did not, that there was a cloud over his career but he gave no hint of the rain that was to fall.
I’ve engaged with Bayly both as the subject of my columns and as the minister overseeing my industry. On almost every issue we disagree but he’s always accessible, answers the phone and can tell me why I am wrong.
There is a reason why Bayly was a minister. He is competent. He works hard. He wants to get things done. Clearly the Prime Minister felt the same because last month Luxon put him in charge of ACC; and ACC is a major economic problem for this government.
The fiscal hole in the corporation threatens Nicola Willis’ ability to balance the books and it was a task outside the ability of the previous minister.
Bayly has a finance background and understood the scale of the problem. He is a man willing to tackle big challenges. In this, the contrast with his former boss is as clear as the horizon on the Antarctic.
Okay. That might be a bad analogy but the reference is Bayly has climbed mountains on that continent while Chris Luxon would be doing well to find it on the map.
So. The speculation is that Andrew Bayly got frustrated with some midranking ACC bureaucrat and, rumours differ, placed a hand on his shoulder or gave him a slight shove. Whatever. He shouldn’t have done it and an apology was in order; but to fire the only chap in your team capable enough to put out a fire because he got short with the guy holding the matches?
To be consistent; I wasn’t optimistic about Bayly’s prospects in the role and said so; which was awkward when I next ran into him but, he assured me with his usual grin, I was wrong. Again. He would fix ACC and I’d owe him an apology.
Luxon has appointed Scott Simpson to the role. Scott’s a good chap. No doubt. Never met him but he was, Wikipedia assures me, the chief executive of the Make-A-Wish foundation which represents Luxon’s approach to tackling the serious problems facing his administration. I am sure it will go well.
There has been coverage of Luxon’s awful interview with Mike Hosking where the Prime Minister stumbled like an Antarctic penguin running away from Gareth Morgan. To continue with the theme. The interview was awful and so has been his treatment of Bayly and, by extension, of the nation he purports to lead.
Luxon could have chastised his minister for being an idiot while recognising the offence was trivial and the media reaction disproportionate. He didn’t. Because this Prime Minister seems to care about managing media coverage and TikTok than tackling the structural fiscal issues that he was elected to deal with.
Sir John Key was quite happy to defend ministers who waded into sticky waters. Murray McCully and his questionable Saudi sheep deal, Gerry Brownlee and his sneaking past airport security, Nick Smith and his entanglement with Bronwyn Pullar’s ACC claim and Chris Finlayson for losing Te Ureweras.
Stuff looks to publish a diverse range of opinions. Sometimes we'll publish opinions you disagree with. That's healthy.
Social media might create echo chambers. Good journalism should not.
Our policy is that our own journalists rarely write opinion pieces. Most of our commentary is from freelance writers or specialists. You can read more about Stuff's policy on managing opinion here.
Key understood that leadership sometimes includes taking heat for your underlings’ shortcomings. Luxon comes from a corporate management background where the preferred strategy is to sacrifice underlings with disregard for their welfare or the team’s morale in order to maintain your position on the greasy pole.
The difference between Luxon and Bayly also warrants comment. Andrew Bayly, when he lost the confidence of his leader, did the honourable thing and spared Luxon the unpleasant task of firing a competent minister because he lacked the fortitude to spend an afternoon staring down the Press Gallery and avoiding calls from Andrea Vance.
In an elegant turn of fate Luxon now finds himself in a similar position. The country is losing confidence in him and, surely, his own caucus are starting to wonder. But the optics of a successful, or worse an unsuccessful, putsch condemns the party to electoral evisceration.
There is a path forward; that taken by Andrew Bayly. To place the interests of his party and the country ahead of personal ambition. Christopher Luxon has not met our, or his party’s, expectations of a Prime Minister......The full article is published HERE
Damien Grant is an Auckland business owner, a member of the Taxpayers’ Union and a regular opinion contributor for Stuff, writing from a libertarian perspective
There is a reason why Bayly was a minister. He is competent. He works hard. He wants to get things done. Clearly the Prime Minister felt the same because last month Luxon put him in charge of ACC; and ACC is a major economic problem for this government.
The fiscal hole in the corporation threatens Nicola Willis’ ability to balance the books and it was a task outside the ability of the previous minister.
Bayly has a finance background and understood the scale of the problem. He is a man willing to tackle big challenges. In this, the contrast with his former boss is as clear as the horizon on the Antarctic.
Okay. That might be a bad analogy but the reference is Bayly has climbed mountains on that continent while Chris Luxon would be doing well to find it on the map.
So. The speculation is that Andrew Bayly got frustrated with some midranking ACC bureaucrat and, rumours differ, placed a hand on his shoulder or gave him a slight shove. Whatever. He shouldn’t have done it and an apology was in order; but to fire the only chap in your team capable enough to put out a fire because he got short with the guy holding the matches?
To be consistent; I wasn’t optimistic about Bayly’s prospects in the role and said so; which was awkward when I next ran into him but, he assured me with his usual grin, I was wrong. Again. He would fix ACC and I’d owe him an apology.
Luxon has appointed Scott Simpson to the role. Scott’s a good chap. No doubt. Never met him but he was, Wikipedia assures me, the chief executive of the Make-A-Wish foundation which represents Luxon’s approach to tackling the serious problems facing his administration. I am sure it will go well.
There has been coverage of Luxon’s awful interview with Mike Hosking where the Prime Minister stumbled like an Antarctic penguin running away from Gareth Morgan. To continue with the theme. The interview was awful and so has been his treatment of Bayly and, by extension, of the nation he purports to lead.
Luxon could have chastised his minister for being an idiot while recognising the offence was trivial and the media reaction disproportionate. He didn’t. Because this Prime Minister seems to care about managing media coverage and TikTok than tackling the structural fiscal issues that he was elected to deal with.
Sir John Key was quite happy to defend ministers who waded into sticky waters. Murray McCully and his questionable Saudi sheep deal, Gerry Brownlee and his sneaking past airport security, Nick Smith and his entanglement with Bronwyn Pullar’s ACC claim and Chris Finlayson for losing Te Ureweras.
Stuff looks to publish a diverse range of opinions. Sometimes we'll publish opinions you disagree with. That's healthy.
Social media might create echo chambers. Good journalism should not.
Our policy is that our own journalists rarely write opinion pieces. Most of our commentary is from freelance writers or specialists. You can read more about Stuff's policy on managing opinion here.
Key understood that leadership sometimes includes taking heat for your underlings’ shortcomings. Luxon comes from a corporate management background where the preferred strategy is to sacrifice underlings with disregard for their welfare or the team’s morale in order to maintain your position on the greasy pole.
The difference between Luxon and Bayly also warrants comment. Andrew Bayly, when he lost the confidence of his leader, did the honourable thing and spared Luxon the unpleasant task of firing a competent minister because he lacked the fortitude to spend an afternoon staring down the Press Gallery and avoiding calls from Andrea Vance.
In an elegant turn of fate Luxon now finds himself in a similar position. The country is losing confidence in him and, surely, his own caucus are starting to wonder. But the optics of a successful, or worse an unsuccessful, putsch condemns the party to electoral evisceration.
There is a path forward; that taken by Andrew Bayly. To place the interests of his party and the country ahead of personal ambition. Christopher Luxon has not met our, or his party’s, expectations of a Prime Minister......The full article is published HERE
Damien Grant is an Auckland business owner, a member of the Taxpayers’ Union and a regular opinion contributor for Stuff, writing from a libertarian perspective
3 comments:
More proof Luxon is annoying the top end of town who have decided the Luxon lead strategy to make life more affordable for Kiwis will reduce their 'royalty' status and wealth.
Much cheaper to pay Pens for hire to constantly denigrate the prime minister in the hope he disappears, than suffer the loss of privilege, the level playing field being worked on by Luxon's government, will deliver.
Although it seems most Kiwis are too clever to fall for the anti Luxon ruse with the coalition amazingly retaining majority support through the long and deep rescession.
A rescession created by the self enriching Labour Party hierarchy, who will by the way regain power if the ridiculous pen for hire stories succeed.....
Think about that disaster before changing your allegiance.
Totally agree that if Luxon can’t move on the total Maorification of NZ to the detriment of the country-he should step down.
PM Luxon certainly seems to be a proponent of the make a wish kind of politics. His head appears to be buried in a small lump of sand with his fingers in his ears and his eyes closed humming kumbaya quietly to himself while the rest of use stand in the middle of the fiery whirlwind that is New Zealand society today.
In almost its entirety New Zealand is consumed by maori 'goodness' from government, economics, academia, corporates and every other thing in between and to the sides.....
It seems that maori culture can do no, and be no wrong and that in that virtue we should all embrace and embolden the culture with if not fevour then with weapons grade indoctrination.
While this happens of course what is ignored is truth, reality and the fragility of civility in our multi-cultural society because no where in human history has any culture been like what we are presented with today in New Zealand....
Make no mistake the culture is her to stay and it provides New Zealand historical background but what it does not do is define New Zealand nor New Zealanders and to foist it upon the citizens like it is a golden egg when the citizens know of the rotten parts in fact makes a mockery of everyones intellegence......which is odd when the Pharmacy Council expects us to respect maori intellegence, what ever that means beacause maori or not one is either an intellegent human being or one is not.
There is and end game running fast toward New Zealanders pleasant or otherwise from this eugenicistic signalling of virtue but one can be rest assured it will sit badly with the majority caught in its outcome.
What we can be certain of however is that the 'utility' of this cultural goodness begins and ends at the border and in the greater wide world the culture is an insignificant speak in a highly charged geo-political arena where-in the Lions take no prisoners.....
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