Brigitte Morton: Political commentator believes delaying telling the public about Andrew Bayly's resignation is no big deal

A defence of the gap between Andrew Bayly's resignation and it being revealed to the public.  

The Port Waikato MP resigned from his ministerial portfolios after a staffer complained about him laying a hand on them last week.  

Bayly resigned on Friday, and it was then made public yesterday.  

Political commentator Brigitte Morton says giving him time to tell his family was a good move and reminds us that politicians are human too.  

She told Andrew Dickens the delay is no big deal.  

Morton says his portfolios weren't important ones like health or civil defence where an emergency is likely to arise. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, obviously, Andrew Bailey I gave up his ministerial portfolios

(00:03):
for an instant with the staffer. He announced it yesterday.
He in fact resigned to the Prime minister on Friday.
He apparently put his hand on the staffer's upper arm
during what he called an animated discussion. But he's refusing
to go into any detail about that discussion. He says
he's apologized, but it's not the first time his conduct
has been questioned. Political commentator bridget to Morton is with

(00:24):
me now, Hello, bridget good morning. So he slowly lost
it in the public eye. Really, he'd already done, he'd
already had the Loser controversy. This was the second one,
and he just realized that time was running out.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Yeah. Absolutely. I think it's very clear that when you're
in an employer employee relationship like he was, that this
kind of behavior is inappropriate. He recognized that, the Prime
Minister recognized that he wasn't really any other way he
could go.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
He's gone to the back benches. He hasn't gone completely.
Should he have gone completely? And if he has gone
to the back benches, is there any way he can
come back up?

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Well, I think you never say never when it comes
to this, but I think it's a difficult road. There's
a lot of talented people on that back bench that
are all waiting to be a ministerial slot as well,
so it's going to be difficult for him to come
back into the cabinet.

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Okay, should he run for MP again or do you
think the electorate might have might have moved against him?

Speaker 2 (01:15):
So, I mean, he's got a very popular electorate. He's
always had a really strong result there, which seems to
indicate at least that there is some you know, you know,
respect for him within the electorate. I think the election
is still a little bit way off, but it would
come down to whether or not that's what he wants
to do with his.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
Career going forward. Okay, Now, look, you mentioned there's plenty
of other back benches who want to step up into
cabinet positions, but there are other political editors have written
that the problem with the National Party, after being hollowed
out by the Labor Party in the previous election, they've
got an awful lot of first terms. Even our Prime
Minister is a first termer. So here's the question, is
National running out of experienced politicians who've been in cabinet seats,

(01:55):
who have been in responsible positions.

Speaker 2 (01:59):
Well, I mean Scott's Simson who stepped into Andrew Bailey's
shoes here has you know, he's been around a long time.
He's a very experienced of Leitch of MP, has previously
been a minister in the former government. So I think
that's an indication that there is some of that talent
on the backbench. Also, as many of us know that
being in parliament itself is not necessarily the only experience
you want for somebody going into a bigger minister sometimes

(02:20):
having those connections into the business world or health or
education a great criteria as well.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
Meanwhile, people are calling Chris Hipkins a hypocrite. Do you
reckon he was in terms of calling.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
That this wasn't dealt with cleanly. Yeah, I think he
has been a bit of a hypocrite here. We've just
got to look at the Michael Woods scandal. You know,
it took like three weeks, he was given personal leave.
You know, he's given multiple warnings. It's just not true
that Happkins would say that, you know, his ministers would
been gold within a couple of hours.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yes, and therefore did Christopher like to make the wrong
move by allowing Bailey to have a weekend, you know,
to resign on Friday, have a weekend to pull himself
together and then announce it to the public. That's been
size as well. This has formed a hole that Chris
Dickins has gone for even if the years hypocritical. So
was that a mistake by Christopher Luxon not to announce
this all on Friday?

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I don't think so. I mean a it is a weekend.
It's the portfolio is a commerce and consumer affears. They're
not something in which he was going to be a
major disaster of the week. We're not talking about how
or civil defense for any of those kind of portfolios.
Also just going to remember sometimes that politicians are people too,
and be able to give his time to tell his
family and also the staff, because remember all those staff

(03:33):
in his office have now actually lost their positions and
have to reapply or make decision about what they do next.
I think it's fears to actually end out sort of
that to happen before the media start, you know, having
their time to go through all of the questions.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
Yeah, I actually maybe I'm maybe I'm an outlier. I
actually thought it was handled pretty well and with decency
to all players.

Speaker 2 (03:54):
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