Jack Tame: Undermining a greater issue

Two days on, it’s fair to say Christopher Luxon’s swift and brutal demotion of Penny Simmonds and Melissa Lee hasn’t met much opposition. I appreciate these are early days for the new government and all Ministers are bedding in, but I don’t think I’ve heard a single person publicly argue that Lee or Simmonds was doing a sufficiently good job. Not one. 

Of course, opposition MPs feel duty-bound to attack in these kinds of moments. Chris Hipkins said it showed the PM had terrible judgement in appointing his Ministers in the first place.  

But the co-leader of Te Pāti Māori found a different reason to criticise it. It wasn’t that Melissa Lee simply wasn’t cut out for Cabinet and that Penny Simmonds was lost at sea. It wasn’t that facing pressures in their portfolios, the new Ministers hadn’t adapted quickly enough. Apparently, it was misogyny. 

Based on what? Well, as Debbie Ngarewa-Packer noted, Luxon hasn’t been as forceful with male MPs in his Cabinet who’ve made public comments out of turn. But, of course, there’s a perfectly good non-gendered explanation for that. The reason Luxon hasn’t publicly hammered ACT and New Zealand First Ministers is that they are ACT and New Zealand First Ministers. 

Arguably... if competence and discipline were the only things concerning the Prime Minister when it comes to Ministerial portfolios and the make up of his Cabinet, Casey Costello might have had an awkward phone call several months ago. 

Some of what Debbie Ngarewa-Packer says is fair enough. She says the Ministers should have been offered more support before being cut, that other senior Ministers should have stepped in and helped. I disagree – Melissa Lee in particular had years to prepare for this moment. But even so... that’s a criticism of the process which doesn’t reflexively bounce to an identity extreme. 

Misogyny exists. Of course it does. It exists in the private sector. It certainly exists in politics. But crying misogyny when Ministers are demoted when there are far more obvious explanations – like incompetence - actually undermines the greater issue. It devalues legitimate misogyny criticisms. Most reasonable people can see Christopher Luxon didn’t demote his Ministers because they’re women. He demoted them because when the pressure came on, they weren’t up to it. 

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