Fleur Fitzsimons: PSA National Secretary on David Seymour's call to limit government ministers

Act Leader David Seymour's taken aim at the size of government. 

He's calling for a limit on the number of ministers, with no ministers outside cabinet, and no associate ministers other than in finance. 

There's currently 82 ministerial portfolios, held by 28 ministers, and he claims they're full of 'meaningless titles'.  

PSA National Secretary Fleur Fitzsimons told Ryan Bridge it's a hypocritical move from Seymour. 

She says both times Act have been in government recently, they've created new agencies. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Seymour wants to clean out cabinet. We've got eighty one
portfolios for ministers. Ireland, similar sized country to US, has seventeen.
Why do we need a racing minister, a Minister for Auckland,
a minister for child poverty reduction? Flurfit Simon's PSA National
secretary with me this morning for good morning, Good morning. Now,
I think you're going to agree with Seymour here. I

(00:22):
think you're going to come on here and you're going
to say, actually, there's too much double up. It's making
life difficult for public servants.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Cut them back, not this morning. I actually just think
it's a typical Act Party attack on the public service
and really our populist dog whist or not a serious proposal.
He himself recognizes that it's not something that he's actually proposing.
He's really just floating it.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Be hand on, Helen, Well, how is this an attack
on the public service? When he's saying the line there
are too many lines of communication, too many reporting lines.
It's making life harder for the public service to know
which master they're serving.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
He's also saying we should get rid of a whole
range of existing public service agencies. He's very clear about that,
and that's because the X Party don't actually believe in
proper funded public services that deliver for all New Zealanders.
They prefer a privatized model of delivery of public idology

(01:22):
sitting behind them.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
Let's look at what he's saying. He's saying, we have
eighty one portfolios for our cabinet of twenty ministers or
whatever it is. How many do you do you know
how many? Ireland has.

Speaker 2 (01:35):
A lot less seventeen, not saying.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Do you know how many? Malway has fewer than twenty,
Finland's the same, The UK and Canada, for good mistakes,
and the US all have fewer than thirty. How does
this make sense?

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Those portfolios are political calls which are up to prime
ministers and leaders, and I'd say it's a bit hypocritical
for David Seymour to be saying he wants to reduce
the both times active being in government. Recently they've created agencies,
firstly the Productivity Commission and more recently the Ministry for Regulation.
But actually, if we think about the problems facing New Zealand,

(02:13):
do we need to invest more in public services like
health and education, law and order, in defense, or do
we need to invest less. They are investing significantly less
on top of job cuts that they imposed last year.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
They're putting more into health. They're putting more into health
than labor promise to.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
They are not putting more into health than previous governments.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
They are not putting more into health than labor promise to.

Speaker 2 (02:36):
Everyone puts more. That is not correct. They already cut
jobs and how they already come. Tell that to a
worker that's lost their job. That to somebody. I'm not
vacancy filled.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
I'm not saying so. I'm not saying people aren't losing
their jobs. Money is being reprioritized. You cannot tell me
yes it is. You cannot tell me that the health bund.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
The people are buying it onto fun text caut.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
Okay, tell me what his borrowing, Tell me what flir.
Tell me what the health budget is, and tell me
how different it is to what labor promised.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
Our health budget has been cut by the skin.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
Tell me so, tell me how much the health budget
is and how different it is to what labor promised.
Because you said that it's different, you said that it's
lest Okay, I will.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
Tell you, first of all, if I have impost cuts
on data and digital on all of the.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
I want a number, flur, I want a number.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
You can't. I don't know today how the problem is,
but I can tell you it's okay.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
Well that's going on a hope and a dream. We
have to leave it there because I'm running out of time.
But that's f if it. Simon's from the PSA, See
you next time. For For more from earlier edition with
Ryan Bridge, listen live to News Talks it'd be from
five am weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio