Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonald

John MacDonald: Life admin and Michael Wood's to-do list


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So the Prime Minister is saying today that the Transport Minister forgetting to sell his Auckland Airport shares - despite being asked to do it six times - could be one of those life admin tasks that the Transport Minister just hasn’t got around to.

And I can relate to that.

You know, it’s like if you’ve got gas hot water at home and the boss is in the shower and you hear a scream and the water’s turned off pretty quickly - you squirm and kick yourself for not ordering a replacement gas bottle sooner.

Or you come back to your car and see the parking officer writing out a ticket because your warrant’s overdue. ‘Jeepers, why didn’t I check the expiry date last week?’

But just like when the boss at home is forced to take a cold shower or when the parking guy’s writing you a ticket for not having a warrant, do you really think you’d get off the hook saying ‘ooh sorry - just a bit of life admin that I didn’t get around to’?

Of course you wouldn’t. With the cold shower situation you’d be out the door like a flash, ripping out the gas bottle from the barbeque and plugging it into the hot water system. And even then, you’d still be in the poo.

And the ticket for not having a warrant - those guys don’t give a damn about the fact that you’re just hopeless and can’t organise yourself to get a warrant on time. You know, the old talk-to-someone-who-cares response.

And so it is with Transport Minister Michael Wood forgetting to sell his airport shares.

Nice try Prime Minister - and maybe Michael Wood is just hopeless when it comes to life admin - but, just like when you run out of gas at home or forget to get a warrant for the car on time, you’re not going to get away with this one either.

The question to consider, though, is whether Michael Wood has been just hopeless or whether there’s more to it.

Because it's not an isolated incident. It comes straight after the situation last week with Education Minister Jan Tinetti failing to correct the record in Parliament, as soon as she realised she’d said something incorrect in the House.

And, before that, we had former minister Stuart Nash getting the boot for emailing donors about confidential Cabinet conversations and other fast-and-loose behaviour.

Remember he was asked if he’d read the Cabinet manual and he said something along the lines of “being aware of it”. Which was basically him saying he hadn’t read it.

So if I wrap all those things together - my view is I don’t think the Government is shifty, but I do think it is slack.

It’s almost as if it still hasn’t got over the shock of ending up in government back in 2017 when Winston Peters kept everyone waiting - as per usual - and then decided he was going to go with Labour.

Remember that? Even the Labour crew had no idea which way he was going to go until that moment. And what happened then, was Labour found itself scrambling trying to find all the staff it needed to run a government.

I know someone who got the last-minute call-up from Wellington to go and work for a new Cabinet minister. It was all go. They had no idea they were going to be forming a government and then it was all on.

And what we’ve seen from some Cabinet ministers over recent weeks makes the Government look like it’s still in the “rabbits-in-the headlights” state it was in five-and-a-half years ago.

And, as we know, a rabbit doesn’t stare at the headlights because it’s clever or shifty. It’s the complete opposite - it stares at the headlights because it’s got no idea how it ended up where it has and it doesn’t know what to do next.

Which is how Jan Tinetti, Michael Wood and, even the Prime Minister himself, look at the moment.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonaldBy Newstalk ZB


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