There's controversy over a New Zealand MP taking part in an anti-government protest in the Cook Islands.
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer has taken part in a rally against Mark Brown's government over its new strategic partnership with China.
The deal will see the countries cooperate more on trade, investment, and tourism, with China providing a $4 million grant for future projects.
Labour’s Ginny Andersen told Mike Hosking it’s not something she would do, but different things do it for different people.
She says that if she wants do go and do that and she’s not breaking the law, then alright.
National’s Mark Mitchell agreed, saying that if he was travelling on personal business he wouldn’t join a protest or interfere with the internal matters, but Ngarewa-Packer has chosen to inject herself into this situation, and that’s up to her.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Jinny Anderson Mark Mitchell wellis for this Politics Wednesday morning
to both of you, how are you? Good morning morning, Jenny,
Good morning now a lot of really interesting things going
on here. First of all, quick question for you, Jinny,
Should Debbie Narewa Paka be on holiday when parliament's on?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Well, I didn't know that. I just saw that actually
something this morning. So and she's And the problem you've got,
I'm guessing is it's for a personal reason.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Isn't it's wedding anniversaries.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Wedding anniversary. Well, I don't think you have to give
exact we can ask for leave, so I don't think
you and your party gives you leave. So I don't
think you can specify what you can and can't have
leave for. As with a job, you're allowed to take
leave at certain times.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
We've given how little parliament sits. Don't you have some
sort of obligation to kind of be present and look
like you might be interested in doing your job.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
That immediately falls on your party and your whip to
determine when you need to be there, and they make
those calls, and of course you know you get picked
out by Mike Hoskins on zib if you make make
decisions that don't reflect well upon yourself. Decision, Yeah, what.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Do you think Mark?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
I think you should be there on a sitting week.
But of course it's like any job. If you are
going to have family events, you are going to have
things that you want to be at, and you'll apply
for leave just like any other job.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
But fundamentally, yes, I think that.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
I think that people vote us and to represent them
and expect us to be there in doing that.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
And what about the business of Mark protest? If you
go to another country as a politician, should you be
involved in a protest in that other country?
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Uh? Well, I personally wouldn't do that if I was
if I was traveling on personal business, I would not
go and join a protest or interfere with You know
that the internal internal matters. But you know, Debbie has
obviously chosen to inject yourself into the situation that's up there.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
What about you, Jenny?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
It will kind of make your holiday, but stink when
you do.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
You thinksy And you got the candles and we're set
to go and hang on, I'll just go to the protest.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Hang on, baby, It's just not something that I would do.
But look, different different things do it for different people.
So I'm not going to If she wants to go
and do that and she's not breaking the law, then.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
Well then the next question is and this is this
is an unanswerable question. But I'm aghast. So she said
on the news last night, and she clearly had no
understanding of Brown China the deal and so everyone assumed
in authority over there that she was there for the protest,
but she was claiming she hadn't heard and it didn't
know anything about it, which then Mark brings to the
(02:40):
question if you're an MP, how ignorant are you allowed
to be before you really shouldn't be an MP?
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Well, I mean she should be engaged and basical issues
around that. I mean it's been discussed a lot around
I guess that maybe that's indicative not having been at
Parliament in Wellington, because these things obviously have been hotly discussed.
So yeah, I mean it just seems very unusual to
me that she'd injected herself into a process that she
didn't actually understand. It was very clear by her comments
(03:09):
that shouldn't actually understand what's going on?
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Are they a ginny? Without naming names obviously, are there
people that ignorant like you? If I rounded up a
bunch of random MPs and just quizzed them generally about
life and times, they wouldn't have a clue what's going on?
Speaker 4 (03:22):
Well, I think it's.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Probably yes, But you could do that with most human beings,
but they're not in that's well. I think generally most
imps have a higher understanding because you're in the beehive
and you're in the air, and you're in that sort
of bubble and yeah, but I think ministers, for example,
are interesting because they know really detailed information about their
(03:45):
own area. But sometimes if you quiz them for something
that's just slightly outside of the area, they have no idea.
So I think it depends on a person, and it
depends on their appetite for learning and taking in new information.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
But this is what disappoints me as a voter and
a punter, is that I would have assumed your appetite
for information and knowledge and being inquisitive was a base
requirement for being a public official.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
You would hope so, Mike, you would hope so. But
these are few in you who probably don't make that threshold.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Name a for you actually, I just I just I
agree with you completely, bloke. I think that it's incumbent
upon people that are representing their communities that they actually
have at least a basic understanding of what's going on
inside our own country, what's going on internetially, and how
that might impact them.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
So listen, I just think that, yes, you should be.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
I'd add to that that I should think. You've got
a roll and talking to people. So I was at
the Tony Fear all day over the weekend, and you
go on the round people, right, but when people come
and talk to you about an issue, you know, if
they've got some information. In this day and age, people
get information that's just wrong, like they've read something from
(04:57):
somewhere that's factually incorrect, and I I take it upon
myself to say, hey, you might want to check out
this source because the stuff you've got is from TikTok
or from somewhere that you might.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Go for you they end up hitting you.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Look some of them are that that happy. But we
probably weren't want to agree from the get go.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
So surely surely you did the sect right at least.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Clearly you've never been to the.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
How much is what are they selling. How much is
candy floss?
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Well, Tony Fear is celebrating. I think it's like it's
a biginn of thestory. You come next year, it's going
to be massive. But Tony rotary tuner on the whole
of Jackson Street gets shut down and it's an amazing thing.
I love.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
I love Jackson Street. It's where o'riley's. You know o'riley's garage. Yes,
you ever go in there and look at the cars.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I've walked past that, but.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Look at the cars.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
I'll try next time. After Mark the Roach report, two
part question, how do you explain that level of incompetent?
And two is that in some way part of the
problem you as a government of facing in making stuff
happen a bit faster than you would a bit slower
than you would like.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Well, it's inexcusable and ENLiGHT So Brian has said, it's
you know, it's really worrying and we can't have it
happen again in our country. And I think that I'm
just very thankful that he's in that position because he's
making sure that our public services held to account.
Speaker 4 (06:22):
I do agree with them.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
I work with our public servants every day and there
are some outstanding people and they're doing some incredible work
behind the scenes.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
But we're all accountable and there has to be accountability.
You can't.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
The problem that we've had is that more and more
money was thrown at things and there was actually you're
getting worse outcomes and the tech that's not tolerable for
us as a country and certainly not for expos.
Speaker 4 (06:43):
Don't expect that, do they go?
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Labor government Ginny have to carry some cap I mean
there's no shortage of people. I mean you stacked that
public service like it had never been stacked and look
at them, they're hopeless.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Well, it had been cleared out as it does always international,
so a lot of that was rebuilding. But I guess
my point would be with the Brian Roach stuff is
that if he's got a plan in some structure, I
think that's a real improvement because what we've seen under
this government is just cuts for the sake of cute.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
But this wasn't This wasn't then, this was back by
the election. This is manare Maria leading into the election.
It's a reflection of the Labor government twenty twenty through
twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
AHFORR I thought you're talking about what ministry is good.
You go like Brian Roches, well, you know.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
We can come to that if you like. But his
report looked at the just the hopelessness of what you
were running at the time, and how no one owns
a decision, wants to own a decision even when people
are going, excuse me, there's problems, no one wants to
hear it. How do you explain that.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Well, that's a real concern in terms of Manyell Murray
and what went on there. And I think there's some
big questions also for the Electoral Commission as to how
that MURI was able to function in that space as
being a place to vote. So yeah, I think there's
some big questions, not just for statistics and how the
information was used, but also why was it a voting place?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
But you guys were in charge ofment.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Well, there's been a full inquiry that the Electoral Commission
make those decisions, not the government. They go in and
say this is a place where people can vote, and
we are comfortable with the fact that it's a safe
place to vote, and we ask those questions that Select
Committee when we had the Electoral Commission before us and
they were pretty clear that they felt they hadn't done
as good as what they could have done, and I
think there needs to be more questions asked about when
(08:25):
determining a place to vote.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
I reckon, there's a scandal brewing here. This is out.
I mean, this is you're in charge of it, Mark,
But it's operational. What happens when the copper who's looking
into the maria and where that information was used, If
it was used nefariously, how does that unfold? Did charges
simply get laid and it's another criminal case. If charges
are to be laid.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Yeah, if they identify that the threshold has been reached,
I mean that is a decision for police. The police
are one of the agencies actively involved in this investigation
and inquiry, and they've stated publicly that they'll be looking
to see whether they or not in of those criminal thresholds.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Met I just I agree with you, Mike.
Speaker 3 (09:04):
I think that you know, we have one of the best, strongest,
most transparent democracies in the world, and this comes to
a question of the integrity of that system when you
see this sort of stuff happening, and it's very serious.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
That's going to be if they lay charges and those
charges are held up in court. That's something dodgy happened
at the Mariah. You've got a parliament that's made up
inappropriately of a person who a person who shouldn't be
there potentially, haven't you.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Well, it's more than that. It's actually the integrity of
your voting system. Because yes, it might be that one instance,
but it actually undermines people's confidence in our democracy. And
that's why it's incredibly important that people know they can
go to a place and vote and it's all above board,
and that's critical for New Zealand to engage people in voting.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
What if it unfolds that way, what's the bigger crime,
the crime that the public service made appalling decisions or
that somebody have been the recipient of those appalling decisions
then took advantage of that.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Well, I think one of the both both are, but
one of the questions for me is why was the
public service making those decisions?
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Why do they think they have the license to do that.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
Anyone looking at it and applying some common sense of
fragmantism would see that they were atrocious decisions that shouldn't
have happened.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
The second part.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Is, yes, who's taken advantage of them and who's been
the beneficiary of it, And so those are the two
big questions that need answer them.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Got the money, You guys appreciate it, Ginny Anderson, Mark Mitchell.
For more from The Mike Asking Breakfast, listen live to
news talks that'd be from six am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
Jinny Anderson Mark Mitchell wellis for this Politics Wednesday morning
to both of you, how are you? Good morning morning, Jenny,
Good morning now a lot of really interesting things going
on here. First of all, quick question for you, Jinny,
Should Debbie Narewa Paka be on holiday when parliament's on?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Well, I didn't know that. I just saw that actually
something this morning. So and she's And the problem you've got,
I'm guessing is it's for a personal reason.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Isn't it's wedding anniversaries.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Wedding anniversary. Well, I don't think you have to give
exact we can ask for leave, so I don't think
you and your party gives you leave. So I don't
think you can specify what you can and can't have
leave for. As with a job, you're allowed to take
leave at certain times.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
We've given how little parliament sits. Don't you have some
sort of obligation to kind of be present and look
like you might be interested in doing your job.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
That immediately falls on your party and your whip to
determine when you need to be there, and they make
those calls, and of course you know you get picked
out by Mike Hoskins on zib if you make make
decisions that don't reflect well upon yourself. Decision, Yeah, what.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Do you think Mark?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
I think you should be there on a sitting week.
But of course it's like any job. If you are
going to have family events, you are going to have
things that you want to be at, and you'll apply
for leave just like any other job.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
But fundamentally, yes, I think that.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
I think that people vote us and to represent them
and expect us to be there in doing that.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
And what about the business of Mark protest? If you
go to another country as a politician, should you be
involved in a protest in that other country?
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Uh? Well, I personally wouldn't do that if I was
if I was traveling on personal business, I would not
go and join a protest or interfere with You know
that the internal internal matters. But you know, Debbie has
obviously chosen to inject yourself into the situation that's up there.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
What about you, Jenny?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
It will kind of make your holiday, but stink when
you do.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
You thinksy And you got the candles and we're set
to go and hang on, I'll just go to the protest.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Hang on, baby, It's just not something that I would do.
But look, different different things do it for different people.
So I'm not going to If she wants to go
and do that and she's not breaking the law, then.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
Well then the next question is and this is this
is an unanswerable question. But I'm aghast. So she said
on the news last night, and she clearly had no
understanding of Brown China the deal and so everyone assumed
in authority over there that she was there for the protest,
but she was claiming she hadn't heard and it didn't
know anything about it, which then Mark brings to the
(02:40):
question if you're an MP, how ignorant are you allowed
to be before you really shouldn't be an MP?
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Well, I mean she should be engaged and basical issues
around that. I mean it's been discussed a lot around
I guess that maybe that's indicative not having been at
Parliament in Wellington, because these things obviously have been hotly discussed.
So yeah, I mean it just seems very unusual to
me that she'd injected herself into a process that she
didn't actually understand. It was very clear by her comments
(03:09):
that shouldn't actually understand what's going on?
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Are they a ginny? Without naming names obviously, are there
people that ignorant like you? If I rounded up a
bunch of random MPs and just quizzed them generally about
life and times, they wouldn't have a clue what's going on?
Speaker 4 (03:22):
Well, I think it's.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Probably yes, But you could do that with most human beings,
but they're not in that's well. I think generally most
imps have a higher understanding because you're in the beehive
and you're in the air, and you're in that sort
of bubble and yeah, but I think ministers, for example,
are interesting because they know really detailed information about their
(03:45):
own area. But sometimes if you quiz them for something
that's just slightly outside of the area, they have no idea.
So I think it depends on a person, and it
depends on their appetite for learning and taking in new information.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
But this is what disappoints me as a voter and
a punter, is that I would have assumed your appetite
for information and knowledge and being inquisitive was a base
requirement for being a public official.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
You would hope so, Mike, you would hope so. But
these are few in you who probably don't make that threshold.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Name a for you actually, I just I just I
agree with you completely, bloke. I think that it's incumbent
upon people that are representing their communities that they actually
have at least a basic understanding of what's going on
inside our own country, what's going on internetially, and how
that might impact them.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
So listen, I just think that, yes, you should be.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
I'd add to that that I should think. You've got
a roll and talking to people. So I was at
the Tony Fear all day over the weekend, and you
go on the round people, right, but when people come
and talk to you about an issue, you know, if
they've got some information. In this day and age, people
get information that's just wrong, like they've read something from
(04:57):
somewhere that's factually incorrect, and I I take it upon
myself to say, hey, you might want to check out
this source because the stuff you've got is from TikTok
or from somewhere that you might.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Go for you they end up hitting you.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Look some of them are that that happy. But we
probably weren't want to agree from the get go.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
So surely surely you did the sect right at least.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Clearly you've never been to the.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
How much is what are they selling. How much is
candy floss?
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Well, Tony Fear is celebrating. I think it's like it's
a biginn of thestory. You come next year, it's going
to be massive. But Tony rotary tuner on the whole
of Jackson Street gets shut down and it's an amazing thing.
I love.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
I love Jackson Street. It's where o'riley's. You know o'riley's garage. Yes,
you ever go in there and look at the cars.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I've walked past that, but.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Look at the cars.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
I'll try next time. After Mark the Roach report, two
part question, how do you explain that level of incompetent?
And two is that in some way part of the
problem you as a government of facing in making stuff
happen a bit faster than you would a bit slower
than you would like.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Well, it's inexcusable and ENLiGHT So Brian has said, it's
you know, it's really worrying and we can't have it
happen again in our country. And I think that I'm
just very thankful that he's in that position because he's
making sure that our public services held to account.
Speaker 4 (06:22):
I do agree with them.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
I work with our public servants every day and there
are some outstanding people and they're doing some incredible work
behind the scenes.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
But we're all accountable and there has to be accountability.
You can't.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
The problem that we've had is that more and more
money was thrown at things and there was actually you're
getting worse outcomes and the tech that's not tolerable for
us as a country and certainly not for expos.
Speaker 4 (06:43):
Don't expect that, do they go?
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Labor government Ginny have to carry some cap I mean
there's no shortage of people. I mean you stacked that
public service like it had never been stacked and look
at them, they're hopeless.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Well, it had been cleared out as it does always international,
so a lot of that was rebuilding. But I guess
my point would be with the Brian Roach stuff is
that if he's got a plan in some structure, I
think that's a real improvement because what we've seen under
this government is just cuts for the sake of cute.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
But this wasn't This wasn't then, this was back by
the election. This is manare Maria leading into the election.
It's a reflection of the Labor government twenty twenty through
twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
AHFORR I thought you're talking about what ministry is good.
You go like Brian Roches, well, you know.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
We can come to that if you like. But his
report looked at the just the hopelessness of what you
were running at the time, and how no one owns
a decision, wants to own a decision even when people
are going, excuse me, there's problems, no one wants to
hear it. How do you explain that.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Well, that's a real concern in terms of Manyell Murray
and what went on there. And I think there's some
big questions also for the Electoral Commission as to how
that MURI was able to function in that space as
being a place to vote. So yeah, I think there's
some big questions, not just for statistics and how the
information was used, but also why was it a voting place?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
But you guys were in charge ofment.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Well, there's been a full inquiry that the Electoral Commission
make those decisions, not the government. They go in and
say this is a place where people can vote, and
we are comfortable with the fact that it's a safe
place to vote, and we ask those questions that Select
Committee when we had the Electoral Commission before us and
they were pretty clear that they felt they hadn't done
as good as what they could have done, and I
think there needs to be more questions asked about when
(08:25):
determining a place to vote.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
I reckon, there's a scandal brewing here. This is out.
I mean, this is you're in charge of it, Mark,
But it's operational. What happens when the copper who's looking
into the maria and where that information was used, If
it was used nefariously, how does that unfold? Did charges
simply get laid and it's another criminal case. If charges
are to be laid.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Yeah, if they identify that the threshold has been reached,
I mean that is a decision for police. The police
are one of the agencies actively involved in this investigation
and inquiry, and they've stated publicly that they'll be looking
to see whether they or not in of those criminal thresholds.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Met I just I agree with you, Mike.
Speaker 3 (09:04):
I think that you know, we have one of the best, strongest,
most transparent democracies in the world, and this comes to
a question of the integrity of that system when you
see this sort of stuff happening, and it's very serious.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
That's going to be if they lay charges and those
charges are held up in court. That's something dodgy happened
at the Mariah. You've got a parliament that's made up
inappropriately of a person who a person who shouldn't be
there potentially, haven't you.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Well, it's more than that. It's actually the integrity of
your voting system. Because yes, it might be that one instance,
but it actually undermines people's confidence in our democracy. And
that's why it's incredibly important that people know they can
go to a place and vote and it's all above board,
and that's critical for New Zealand to engage people in voting.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
What if it unfolds that way, what's the bigger crime,
the crime that the public service made appalling decisions or
that somebody have been the recipient of those appalling decisions
then took advantage of that.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
Well, I think one of the both both are, but
one of the questions for me is why was the
public service making those decisions?
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Why do they think they have the license to do that.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
Anyone looking at it and applying some common sense of
fragmantism would see that they were atrocious decisions that shouldn't
have happened.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
The second part.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Is, yes, who's taken advantage of them and who's been
the beneficiary of it, And so those are the two
big questions that need answer them.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Got the money, You guys appreciate it, Ginny Anderson, Mark Mitchell.
For more from The Mike Asking Breakfast, listen live to
news talks that'd be from six am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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