Barry Soper: Senior Political Correspondent on Health NZ, Peters DEI changes, Labour reshuffle, Justin Trudeau address

Health Minister Simeon Brown is making major changes by bringing back the board of Health New Zealand. 

It comes as an audit of the public health agency found financial difficulties and "significant concerns." 

Senior Political Correspondent Barry Soper tells Ryan Bridge one of those concerns was senior management not having a meeting for two years. 

"If it was laughable, you'd say it was an orchestrated litany of laughs, but it's not because it's not funny," he said. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Barry Soaper, senior political correspondent here for US. Good afternoon,
burrid afternoon. Right, Yes, so I men Brown on this
program after five. But he's been making ann out since
some big changes today.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Well he has been, hasn't he. And it's on the
back of that Deloitte's report and I heard your editorial
on it. I mean it's incredible, isn't it. Really the
left hand didn't know what the right hand is doing,
although in this case both hands were amputated by the
sounds of things. I mean, the senior management not having
meetings for more than two years, which is extraordinary when

(00:29):
you think about it, and you know, if it was laughable,
you'd say it was an orchestrated littany of laughs. But
it's not because it's not funny. We're spending I mean,
this government has now committed more than sixteen billion dollars
over and above what was being spent on health, and
what really have we got to show for it at
the moment. We've got a health commissioner in place and

(00:53):
swimming and Brown. You know, no matter what good intentions
health ministers have, it's a never ending bottomless pit. Is
always demands on the health system now, Simeon Brown seems
to know what he wants, but when he talks local,
which is what he says, they're going back to local.
Does that mean a return to district health boards.

Speaker 3 (01:15):
You need to make sure that it's nationally planned, but
it's locally delivered. And the reality is when Labour centralized
Health New Zealand into a one mega entity, they took
away control. They took away decision making from local leaders
and from the districts, and that is meant that we've
ended up with an overly bureaucratic system. It's now about
decentralizing Health New Zealand, focusing it back on the districts

(01:37):
and giving power back to those regions that they can
make decisions and the best interests of the patients. I
want the best people who have a track record in
delivery on this board. It's a thirty billion dollar organization.
It's one of the biggest organizations in the Southern Hemisphere,
and every single part of that organization needs to be
focused on delivery.

Speaker 2 (01:54):
Yeah, it is big, but no matter what size, it
never seems to be to hit the mark. What I
always found extraordinary, Ryan, was that the district health boards
were disbanded right at the height of COVID, where we
should have been concentrating on other things, which is exactly
not about restructuring the health system.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
Exactly what the then opposition was saying right now is
not the time, and this report makes pretty clear that
it wasn't.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
It wasn't the time.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
Now. Winston Peters is on One today. He's talking about DEI.
He's got the war on the woke. We've had him
on the show this afternoon. I heard a thing about this.
Though it's very hard to prove that there is a
widespread problem with this because how do you know why
someone was hired?

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Well, that's the problem, isn't it, Because there's no hard
and fast rules, although there is expectations in the public service,
and we're constantly being told how women are disadvantaged when
compared to men. There's an interesting thing that came out today.
The Teacher Aides though beginning discussions across the country next week.

(03:01):
They are looking at taking legal action on the Equal
Pay Act, the Ministry of Education against the Ministry of
Education the review of their pay required under the Act.
They say they won an initial equity settlement in twenty twenty,
but it shows their pay now basically is seventeen percent

(03:24):
behind what men are doing with exactly the same skill set. Now,
that is where it is unfair. If you're doing exactly
the same jobs, you shouldn't be generally across the board
paid that much less than men. But there is a
problem when they have automatic increases, which is what they
tend to do in the public service, you've got a

(03:46):
problem because women leave the workforce, they have broken service
and then men, so those figures can be skewed.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Thing about the pay gap, the gender pay gap is
women live longer than men. So that isn't it all?
Even outlies labors reshuffle today very quickly we can run
through well, not great, does it really?

Speaker 2 (04:11):
I mean I found even more interesting than the reshuffle.
I mean Ginny Anderson, who of course has been accident
prone as we've seen over the past year. She's received
a new portfolio jobs and incomes, and there's a new
sort of a finance team Barbarad and Edmunds. She keeps
the finance portfolio but is looking at a portfolio called

(04:32):
savings and investment. And guess what they've announced their two
thousand and twenty six election campaign. What they're going to
be concentrating on wait for it, this is a big
surprise job, jobs, health, and homes. Oh gosh.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
Exactly interesting though, that they've got five in their economy team.
Five people. I mean, how many people does it take
to drive a car?

Speaker 2 (04:56):
I hope they have some meetings.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
In person quickly before you go, Bear, I have to
play this for you because I think you'll appreciate it
in the same way I do, which is my reaction
is sort of a dry reach. But this is justin Trudeau.
Oh no, Please to the Canadian people after Trump's coming
for them with the terriffs, have Heaver listens and I
think he didn't realize the oscars will last week, have
a listener.

Speaker 4 (05:16):
I've made sure that every single day in this office
I put Canadians first, that I have people's backs, and
that's why I'm here to tell you all we got you,
even in the very last days of this government. We
will not let Canadians down today and long into the future.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
Oh please, I've seen that man at so many international
conferences that I've attended. He walks through hotel four years
leading his group of people, but walks away ahead of
them and looks side to side, hoping that people will
know who he is. A lot of people just look blankly, No.

Speaker 1 (05:59):
That weirdo who is Well, he won't be there much longer,
will he? Thank you for that very Soper Senior political correspondent.
And the way he says in the last days of
my government like they're wrung back per year. He's dead,
well exactly except quite right. It has just gone ten
away from five News Talk, said b don't forget some
men brown after five for.

Speaker 3 (06:18):
More from hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news Talks.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
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