Mental Health Inquiry & Afghan Inquiry – two more whitewashes & more evidence of a corrupt neoliberal public service

The infection of neoliberalism runs deep within our public service and the main driving force of almost all public services in NZ is to hide their failings.

With the Government ignoring recommendations from the Tax Working Group and the latest welfare expert advisory group, we have two glaring examples of a public service hell bent on protecting the establishment, not putting them on trial.

The unbelievable revelations that Māori voices have been gutted and sanitised from the Mental Health inquiry…

Were Māori sidelined in the mental health inquiry?

Were vulnerable Māori sidelined by the Government’s much-vaunted mental health and addiction inquiry? Some recent reporting suggests this has been the case. 

In the flush of its 2017 election win, the Jacinda Ardern-led Government promised two major inquiries would launch within 100 days. One was into mental health and the other the historical abuse of children in state care. Hearings for the latter will get under way this year, with the first report due after the 2020 election. 

The mental health and addiction inquiry saw meetings held and thousands of submissions heard across New Zealand during 2018. While the findings were released in December, the Government’s official response has been delayed twice and now looks likely to appear around the time of this month’s Budget. 

But Māori input into the report seems to have been minimised. Māori are mentioned only three times in the 40 recommendations attached to the report. A supplementary report on Māori submissions was delayed, rewritten and dramatically edited, according to Dr Lynne Russell, a senior Māori health researcher who co-authored the report. The original version of the Māori report was leaked online in December by Māori health organisation Te Rau Matatini​, which wanted “the missing voices [to be] heard”. But the online link was just as quickly deleted. A more sanitised, much shorter version with a different title appeared in January.

…is made even more offensive by threats by the public service to fine anyone $10 000 for highlighting this grotesque censorship…

…so while there is butt covering within the flawed mental health service we have the inquiry into possible war crimes in Afghanistan also being whitewashed…

Operation Burnham: Inquiry unlikely to hear from Afghan villagers

The inquiry is investigating allegations that New Zealand soldiers killed six Afghan civilians during a military operation in 2010 and the military then covered up what happened.

The allegations were the subject of a book, Hit & Run, by journalists Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson.

In a minute released yesterday, the inquiry said travelling to Afghanistan to speak to the villagers would be a logistically challenging, time consuming and expensive process.

…apparently investigating war crimes and talking with those closest to who we killed and harmed might be an inconvenience.

The problem is the neoliberal public service is there to protect itself, not the welfare of the people and its certainly not there to hold itself to account.

As someone who is facing a secret trial with secret evidence against the NZ Police, I have witnessed first hand the manner in which the state protects itself from accountability.

The Left have looked to the State as the great leveller of Capitalism’s inequalities and with so many vocal left twitter union voices working inside those very same public services in Wellington, the point blank refusal to recognise and challenge this is conveniently ignored by those who are paid by those same agencies.

What is required is a purge within the public services and Politicians with the courage to stand up to the bureaucrats  alongside a political agenda to truly reform the State Services Act.

We could start with every Māori Politician releasing the full uncensored Māori Mental Health report and daring the public service to fine them $10 000.