The latest and perhaps the most salutary is the MBIE boss Nick Blakeley. The Privileges Committee has found that Blakeley and former Immigration New Zealand head Alison McDonald deliberately misled, what you and I might call lying, deliberately misled Parliament. And the Privileges Committee said their conduct was an insult to the public service. That is damning. The reason why, in a select committee hearing back in March, Blakeley and McDonald were asked about the progress of an expensive biometric upgrade program, and they failed to disclose that the project had already been cancelled. When the truth was revealed that the people responsible for the failed program had just kept going, just kept taking taxpayers' dollars knowing that the money was going to be wasted, when asked direct questions about it, they lied.
Immigration Minister Erica Stanford was quite rightly apoplectic. Blakeley has offered his resignation to Public Service Commissioner Brian Roche, who rejected it on the basis that Blakeley had only been in the role six weeks. Yeah, but he lied, and so did Alison McDonald. And despite Blakeley uttering weasel words on Heather du Plessis Allan's show last night, explaining just how the lie came about, he should have been sacked.
Immigration Minister Erica Stanford was quite rightly apoplectic. Blakeley has offered his resignation to Public Service Commissioner Brian Roche, who rejected it on the basis that Blakeley had only been in the role six weeks. Yeah, but he lied, and so did Alison McDonald. And despite Blakeley uttering weasel words on Heather du Plessis Allan's show last night, explaining just how the lie came about, he should have been sacked.
NB: The committee found that the incomplete information that we provided amounted to a contempt of Parliament, to deliberately misleading Parliament. That's extremely serious and I'm deeply disappointed that the ministry and myself have fallen well short of expectations. At the time, there were budget and commercial sensitivities that we understood couldn't be discussed in a public forum. We got that wrong, we should have taken a different approach. That's what I said to the Privileges Committee when I gave them evidence.
HDPA: So you went to Brian Roche, and you said that you're prepared to quit, and he said don't?
NB: I offered my resignation. He came to his judgment. He pointed out one of the factors.
HDPA: What was his judgment, Nick? Did he say don't quit?
NB: One of the factors that he took into account was that I hadn't long been in the role. That was also noted in the Privileges Committee.
HDPA: Who cares? You're the one sitting there fibbing. That's the most important thing. Nick, did he say to you don't quit?
NB: He said he thought that would be the wrong response and that he will be holding me account for how I respond and that is what I'm focused on doing now.
HDPA: Yeah, well, that's disappointing. I think you should have quit because how are we going to know next time that you're telling the truth or just giving us a Nick special?
NB: Look, I have accepted the finding, I've apologised, I'm fronting up and I'm going to be fixing it. We're going to be much better prepared in future for select committees.
God, I love my colleague. While I do believe that nothing short of a public flogging in the town square will begin to drive the message home to public servants that they need to be more accountable, more responsible, more careful in how they spend our money, more like the private sector and taking ownership for snafus, until the public floggings begin, a good grilling from Heather du Plessis Allan will do as a good down payment. No wonder she's the broadcaster of the year, second year running. A "Nick Special" may well enter the lexicon as a euphemism for a lie.
We think 'Gliding On' and 'Yes Minister' are clever, funny comedies from yesteryear, but public service incompetence, public service lies, public service cover ups, public service treating ministers like children, it's alive and well. And when it involves the wasting of so much taxpayer money, when it involves complete and utter contempt of Parliament, nothing my Minister needs to worry her pretty little head about, I'll deal with this, throwing good money after bad so your own incompetence is not exposed, when you're asked directly about it, you lie, when it involves bringing the good hard working members of the public service into disrepute, there is nothing bloody funny about it.
Kerre McIvor, is a journalist, radio presenter, author and columnist. Currently hosts the Kerre Woodham mornings show on Newstalk ZB - where this article was sourced.
4 comments:
Kerre.
Recently, I have commented several times on articles on our public service and readers may be growing tired of seeing my name.
However, my twenty years in the public service revealed astonishing dysfunction in several of our public service workplaces. I retired due to illness several years ago but I have been keeping in touch with colleagues and friends who still work in the public service. It seems to me that it is no better today than it was in my time.
Political neutrality, or rather the lack of it in certain agencies, appointment of inexperienced and underqualified people into highly-remunerated managerial and leadership positions, cronyism, a lack of respect for genuine expertise and, of course, the bullying that I and others have spoken about many times – all of these things are present in the system.
The public service must be re-developed from the ground-up. It needs to be made clear that it serves both the people and the Government of the day. We need stronger expectations and standards around the appointment and accountability of Chief Executives.
We must ensure appointment of all staff on the basis of merit because for many years rapid promotion often has goneto the most aggressive personalities or else to those who adhere to particular ideological or political world views – almost the opposite of a genuine meritocracy.
The view that a person does not need subject matter expertise to be a manager leads to all sorts of problems, principally decision-making going to the less qualified and the less capable. It has led to the emergence of opportunists who want the prestige and remuneration that goes with the management stream, but without putting in the years of effort required to develop skills and expertise.
The role of Human Resources must be re-configured to ensure optimum capability and productive workplaces. The competency-based interview must be dispensed with, as it is a flawed mechanism for selecting staff, allowing hiring managers or senior executives to appoint on the basis of everything but competence. Very often the most highly qualified and accomplished are deliberately overlooked in favour of the less qualified, less experienced and the less accomplished. Stronger protections are needed if we are to put an end to often unfair dismissals and brutal managing-out.
The Public Service Commission must lift its game. It must step in and enforce high expectations and ensure that the Model Standards Speaking up (Public Service Commission, 2025) and the Code of Conduct for the Public Service (Public Service Commission, 2026) have genuine force because at present they are being ignored.
REFERENCES
Public Service Commission (2025). Model Standards: Speaking Up
https://www.publicservice.govt.nz/guidance/model-standards-speaking-up
Public Service Commission (2026a). The Code of Conduct for the Public Sector
https://www.publicservice.govt.nz/guidance/the-code-of-conduct-for-the-public-sector
Immigration and MBIE are in a real mess.
This is a comment thread on the effects people are feeling from employers being accredited for things like pizza, vape stores, and fast food
https://www.reddit.com/r/newzealand/comments/1v4y88y/if_youre_wondering_why_young_people_cant_find_a/
As one said - looking forward to seeing this on the TV news and reading about it in the paper.
And getting accredited for liquor, doordash and delivereasy
https://substack.com/home/post/p-212389786
Not sure if links are allowed. But if not they can be cut and pasted.
It looks like hundreds, if not thousands, of employers are being accredited to hire from overseas for things like pizza, liquor, vape, doordash, lotto outlets, and a lot of other suspect reasons - and it's being kept hidden from the general public.
The travesty is the FMA receives $25 of the $57.20 annual company filing fee to fund its operating budget. Defund them and reduce business owner compliance costs.
You can just imagine Brian Roche. Hey Nick, don't worry about it. You were new to the post. Obviously for hundreds of thousands of dollars a year we don't expect competence. The idea you would have demanded to be properly briefed would be way up over a million. Next time, try not to get caught, otherwise I will have to find a new department for you to work in. With a pay rise for the inconvenience of course.
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