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Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says she retains confidence in the Speaker, but has expressed “serious concerns” to him about his conduct.
What a complete joke! The PM says that her concerns about Speaker Trevor Mallard are “serious”, yet she hasn’t taken them seriously at all. Her only action on the matter (apart from talking to him while wearing her frowny face) is to put him in charge of looking into his own misbehaviour!
Ardern has asked the Speaker to reconvene a cross-party working group to consider how the Behavioural Standards can be given practical effect when MPs are dealing with sensitive staff conduct matters such as sexual assault.
She has literally put the fox in charge of the hen house. Mallard should be nowhere near the working group since he is the reason that it is needed in the first place.
A PM with any spine would have forced his removal a long time ago.
When National was in power, National MPs were removed merely for being arrogant when out in public, saying things like, “Do you know who I am?” yet Mallard is still in a position of power despite repeated actions that show that he is not fit to be an MP let alone a Speaker of the House.
Mallard now has a large target on his back and for as long as Ardern keeps protecting him it will be duck shooting season for the Opposition all the way up until the election in 2023.
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