In a statement that has resonated with many New Zealanders, ACT’s Public Service spokesperson Todd Stephenson affirmed that the public sector must return to a system where competence, not identity, determines leadership.
“If you’re vying to become a public service boss, it shouldn’t matter whether you’re brown, white, or blue. What matters is whether you are competent to deliver the services we expect for our taxes,” said Stephenson.
It’s a message rooted in plain common sense. Over recent years, government departments and agencies have drifted toward an ideological fixation on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at the expense of the core public service mission: delivering results for all New Zealanders. ACT is rightly calling this trend what it is: corrosive.
“A creeping focus on people’s identity over merit in the public sector is corrosive. It distracts from service delivery, elevates less competent candidates, and is fundamentally racist,” Stephenson added.
In the party’s view, this ideological shift has eroded trust, fostered division, and undermined the quality of public sector leadership. In response, the coalition agreement ACT helped shape will amend the Public Service Act “to clarify the role of the public service, drive performance, and ensure accountability to deliver on the agenda of the government of the day.”
This is a move in the right direction. Most New Zealanders don’t care about the personal identity of the official responsible for securing critical medicines, improving schools, or coordinating emergency responses. They simply want someone who can get the job done.
“Real inclusion means treating people as individuals, not representatives of demographic groups,” said Stephenson. “It’s difficult to convince public servants to treat all New Zealanders equally when their own organisation hires people through a lens of identity.”
With ACT in government, there is a renewed commitment to integrity, fairness and effectiveness in the public sector, values that should never have been sacrificed in the name of political fashion.
Matua Kahurangi is just a bloke sharing thoughts on New Zealand and the world beyond. No fluff, just honest takes. He blogs on https://matuakahurangi.com/ where this article was sourced.
It’s a message rooted in plain common sense. Over recent years, government departments and agencies have drifted toward an ideological fixation on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at the expense of the core public service mission: delivering results for all New Zealanders. ACT is rightly calling this trend what it is: corrosive.
“A creeping focus on people’s identity over merit in the public sector is corrosive. It distracts from service delivery, elevates less competent candidates, and is fundamentally racist,” Stephenson added.
In the party’s view, this ideological shift has eroded trust, fostered division, and undermined the quality of public sector leadership. In response, the coalition agreement ACT helped shape will amend the Public Service Act “to clarify the role of the public service, drive performance, and ensure accountability to deliver on the agenda of the government of the day.”
This is a move in the right direction. Most New Zealanders don’t care about the personal identity of the official responsible for securing critical medicines, improving schools, or coordinating emergency responses. They simply want someone who can get the job done.
“Real inclusion means treating people as individuals, not representatives of demographic groups,” said Stephenson. “It’s difficult to convince public servants to treat all New Zealanders equally when their own organisation hires people through a lens of identity.”
With ACT in government, there is a renewed commitment to integrity, fairness and effectiveness in the public sector, values that should never have been sacrificed in the name of political fashion.
Matua Kahurangi is just a bloke sharing thoughts on New Zealand and the world beyond. No fluff, just honest takes. He blogs on https://matuakahurangi.com/ where this article was sourced.
4 comments:
I dont expect Mi??gi of RNZ to "interview" Stephenson on the topic.
From Inclusion to Inquisition
There’s a peculiar cruelty in watching a good idea get taken hostage by bad ideology. That’s exactly what’s happened with DEI—Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Originally framed as a moral appeal to widen opportunity and treat people with fairness, it has mutated into something else entirely: a movement that trades in division, resentment, and fear, and enforces its new orthodoxy with the zeal of a religious cult.
In the hands of academia and media elites, it has become a weapon. No longer a call for inclusion, it’s now a broad paintbrush to smear, silence, and ruin.
Ask a university professor what diversity means today, and you’ll hear about “lived experience,” “epistemic injustice,” or “decolonizing the curriculum.” Or being its “authentic” self as a notorious bussy loving green mp has said. What you won’t hear is anything about excellence, objectivity, or open inquiry—those are now considered colonial relics. When every historical inequity is viewed through the lens of identity and power, there is no room for dissent, only repentance.
And that ideological mission doesn’t stop at the gates of the university. It spreads through the media, the civil service, and increasingly, the corporate sector.
In New Zealand, DEI isn’t just a trend—it’s state-sanctioned dogma.
Take the Public Interest Journalism Fund, where newsrooms received taxpayer money under the condition they uphold “Te Tiriti principles.” Translation: publicly funded media were effectively required to adopt a politicised reading of the Treaty of Waitangi, shaping coverage to reflect one narrative only. This is not journalism. It’s propaganda underwritten by the state.
And the arbiters of this new moral order? They get to play by a different set of rules.
Stuff’s Andrea Vance, made headlines recently when she used low-brow, crude, personal, and undeniably sexist phrases to cancel finance minister Nicole Willis. But instead of national outrage or demands for her sacking/resignation, we got a doubling down, no apology and a quick return to business as usual.
if a conservative columnist had used that word to describe a female Labour minister. Would the mainstream media have been so forgiving? Would the ombudsman have been so quiet?
Of course not. Because in the world of DEI, double standards aren’t a flaw—they’re a feature.
In this framework, offense is not about the act—it’s about who commits it. The rules shift depending on where you sit in the intersectional hierarchy. Say the wrong thing while occupying the “wrong” identity, and you’re out: canceled, boycotted, doxxed. Say the right thing from the right identity, and you can get away with nearly anything—even abuse masquerading as virtue.
New Zealand’s experiment with co-governance follows the same pattern. What was once a constitutional partnership is now rebranded as permanent ethnic dualism. The unelected Maori wards, and co-governed resource management bodies all fly under the banner of “equity”—but what they really offer is segmented citizenship, not social cohesion. If you’re against this, you’re not engaging in a policy debate—you’re accused of racism.
Thomas Sowell warned us long ago: “Much of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good.”
That’s DEI in a nutshell. It sounds good. It feels good. But it doesn’t work.
If diversity is to mean anything, it must include diversity of thought. If equity is to matter, it must be earned, not engineered. And if inclusion is to endure, it must not come at the cost of truth, merit, or the right to disagree.
DEI is not progress. It stands for Dogma, Entitlement, and Intimidation—and that, to borrow Sowell’s clarity, is not a step forward. It’s a march off the cliff.
With this website, I find that many of the printed Opines and those posted comments, such as the one posted May, 14 @ 1:58PM only get read by a small group of people.
It would be interesting to know who that person is, because when you read what is printed - there is common sense.
Sadly many New Zealander's will not and/or may not know who Thomas Sewell is. If other readers ponder this point, go to YouTube, in the search Engine type the name - then select any and all - listen - learn. The gentleman is well known & renowned for both His intellect and insights on many topics.
On the other hand, we have here in New Zealand, those who would " attack " the posted comment " (@1:58PM) as being distasteful, the words causing harm, or equated to Hate Speech.
Sad that we have got to that stage in our daily lives.
We are one
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