Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is copping a load of flak right now after more border cock-ups have been revealed. You know there is nothing but bad news because she’s making poor Chris Hipkins and the hapless Megan Woods front the press conferences.
She doesn’t do bad news, but she can’t hide in the house, which resumed yesterday.
Straight away she was on the back foot and not sounding very happy at all. Her answers were an exercise in grimacing and whining, in equal parts.
Now she is wanting to have any politicking removed from criticism of her government’s appalling lapses at the border.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has called for politics to be taken out of the Government’s COVID-19 response as Opposition leader Judith Collins grilled her on the lack of testing of border workers.
The Prime Minister acknowledged in Parliament on Tuesday that the Opposition has contributed to constructive criticism of the Government’s response, paying tribute to National’s health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti.
“I have to concede that in my view that at these times I absolutely expect as a Government we should be held to account. That is why we are here,” Ardern said.
“I also have to say that the kinds of contributions by Dr Reti are the kinds of contributions that I think add something when New Zealand is in the situation we are in.”
But the Prime Minister hit out at the Opposition over criticism of the Government’s testing regime and previous calls to ease lockdown restrictions.
“What I don’t think adds to the situation is if we have anyone that unnecessarily calls into question the role, for instance, of testing, the importance of restrictions and limiting spread. There are areas where I think it would be useful if we took the politics out of the response.“
Well excuse me, but it was the Prime Minister who declared that this election was a COVID election. She can’t now claim to want to remove politics from the debate surrounding their debacles.
If she truly wants to remove politics from the debate then she’d do well to tell her other ministers to stop carping on about how National voted when they were passing legislation. After all they should practice what she preaches.
But the Prime Minister is ever the hypocrite as she sought to fight this election bereft of policy and only on her response to the Chinese plague. Now that the truth of their inept handling is coming out she is seeking to hide from deserved criticism.
Winston Peters has called for heads to roll, but hasn’t been specific on whose heads should roll:
Peters said something had gone wrong at the Ministry of Health.
“When you have given an assurance to ministers and to the public that this is going on, when you find out that those things are not going on, then you’ve got to ask: ‘what on earth is happening?’” Peters said.
When asked if he thought “heads should roll” he said they should.
“When you find out that something that was promised to be done has not been done, then it’s got to be, like business like every other profession I know, a thing called accountability.”
“The reality is when I find that 40 per cent of a certain institution that needed to be checked and monitored and tested have not been, I get plain alarmed.”
Heads should roll, but I’d be starting with the PM, then the Health Minister and then the Housing Minister. They’ve made more than enough public statements that testing was being done when they clearly knew that it wasn’t. Hell’s teeth they only made testing compulsory last week!
Ashley Bloomfield has said that the ministers were briefed, but there was “dissonance”. That clearly means they either didn’t read their briefings or ignored their briefings. Either way, it is the ministers who have made false claims. They lied, they need to go.
Winston could end this farce very quickly indeed. Perhaps if the splatter starts raining down on him he will act.
The Prime Minister may want to “take the politics out of the response”, but that can be translated to “Please don’t hold me to account for my response”.
Whining and obfuscating is unbecoming and it is starting to look like she feels intimidated by Judith Collins. She just doesn’t get it. She isn’t paid half a million dollars to fiddle while the economy burns and play with the toddler. She’s paid to lead. If she can’t or won’t do that, then it is time for the adults to take over.
The Prime Minister wanted a COVID election. Well, she’s got what she wanted. No use whining about the politics of it all.
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