National supports Pike River re-entry

Rumours abound that there is a coup coming against Simon Bridges, from Paula Bennett and Mark Mitchell. Paula has lost a lot of weight and has had a complete makeover in anticipation of this move. Mark Mitchell, in trying also to make his mark, has decided to move away from National Party policy… and go straight into the arms of the Labour government.

Hint to Mark  Mitchell: if you want the voters to notice you, don’t adopt policies that the government has already adopted, which many of your own voters think are a monstrous waste of money.

The National Party is accepting advice that the Pike River re-entry can now be done safely, taking politics off the table on an issue that has been a bitter political battleground.

Yesterday, the party’s Pike River recovery spokesman, Mark Mitchell, met with the Families Reference Group – which represents more than 80 per cent of Pike River victims’ families – and told them National supported the re-entry plan.

I am truly sorry for the tragedy that was Pike River, and for the families of the men who were killed. Some of the families want to move on with their lives, and some are determined, come hell or high water, to prove that it is a crime scene and that someone should be held accountable. Whether it is safe to enter the mine now or not – and that is still a big question – what happens if they enter the drift and find absolutely nothing? Millions of taxpayer’s money will have been sunk into this project – for what?

“We would have gone into the drift but the advice was that it was too dangerous,” Mitchell said.

“The advice now is that we can get in there, and we completely support that.”

Well, I don’t and I guarantee that a lot of National voters don’t support it either. It has been almost 9 years and there will be little, if any, remains of the miners left to retrieve… if that is what the object of this exercise is, of course.

Sonya Rockhouse, who lost her son Ben in the 2010 tragedy, welcomed the support.

“Even though it’s taken so long, it’s good to know they’ve swung in behind us getting truth and justice.

Perhaps it isn’t about retrieving the remains of their family members. It sounds like a witch hunt to me.

The families’ group has not been shy about expressing its disappointment with the previous Government, not only about re-entry but also for feeling at arms’ length from information about the mine and the decision-making process.

A Newspaper.

Just as you thought things could not get worse with National… they just did.

This move is nothing more than utter stupidity from National as they have another ?Me Too? moment.

Labour, the Greens and NZ First all politicised this tragedy. Now Mark Mitchell is trying to raise his profile as a possible future leader by backtracking on National policy and agreeing with the government? There are no votes for National in this, and a strong chance that the party will lose the support of many of its core voters.

National’s point of difference has disappeared with Mitchell committing National to backing re-entering the mine. This is crass stupidity of the first order.

You may be forgiven for thinking that this is an attempt by Mark Mitchell to raise his profile ahead of his and Bennett’s plan to oust Simon Bridges. If so, then Mitchell has no clue what he is doing. It is madness.