It has not been a good week for Winston, Gerry or Democracy in Parliament last week
I like Gerry and Winston can make me laugh from time to time, but sweet Jesus even their greatest supporters would have to admit it has been a nightmare week in Parliament for Winston, Gerry AND NZ Democracy.
Winston had a self blundering massacre this week in Parliament.
Calling Teanau Tuiono a foreigner who shouldn’t be in Parliament because he said ‘Aotearoa New Zealand’ is not only absurd, it’s factually wrong!
Tuiono was born in West Auckland FFS, how is he not a Kiwi because he has Cook Islands Māori ancestry?
Rather than back down, Winston plowed on and doesn’t seem to care because he’s appealing to sub 5% threshold voters to leave their fringe party and join an openly race baiting one instead.
He’s the calcified bigotry of assimilation Māori who have traded in their own mana for the baubles of office.
He’s an illness, not a political movement.
Gerry won no favours last week either, when he refused to punish Winston for what he said…
In a lengthy back-and-forth, Labour MPs took issue with Brownlee’s decision not to take further action against Peters, particularly as he had said members who made such comments could be ejected.
Shadow Leader of the House Kieran McAnulty said at the very least, Peters should have been made to withdraw and apologise.
“In August last year, you required Chlöe Swarbrick to withdraw and apologise for comments that were made on the day prior. Now, at the time we expressed concern about that, because we felt in doing so, that was setting a precedent,” McAnulty said.
“But nevertheless, here we are again in a situation where you are saying that you are unable to require a member to withdraw and apologise for something that happened yesterday.”
McAnulty said it ran the risk of applying different standards to some but not others, a point Brownlee accepted, and said he would avoid in the future.
Labour MP Willie Jackson said he took “personal offence” to Peters’ comments, to which Brownlee asked why he did not raise that at the time.
Swarbrick also encouraged the Speaker to apply the same consistency, “lest you be accused of double standards”, a comment Brownlee said was “borderline trifling” with the chair.
Green MP Ricardo Menéndez March pursued a different line of questioning, relating to Peters’ assertion that Tuiono was from Rarotonga.
“Unless the former deputy prime minister was deliberately trying to mislead the House, I think a correction should be an order, because there was a factually incorrect statement being made about where he was born.”
Brownlee said Menéndez March was making a suggestion there had been a breach of privilege, and there were processes for dealing with that.
Eventually, Brownlee called the matter to a close, and Question Time began, but the matter was not settled for the opposition.
After Brownlee chastised Jackson for repeated interruptions, McAnulty raised a further point of order.
“It’s quite clear that Willie Jackson is on a warning that if he interrupts you again he’ll be sent out,” McAnulty began.
“No it’s not,” Brownlee said.
“OK, so he can carry on?” replied McAnulty, to which Brownlee warned him he would be trifling with the chair if he carried on.
“I’m concerned that just by that statement it’s quite clear that you’re saying that if I trifle with you again that I will leave, but you won’t even require someone making a racist comment to withdraw and apologise,” McAnulty said.
He was then ordered to leave the House.
Speaking on the tiles shortly afterwards, McAnulty repeated his belief the Speaker was applying double standards.
“Winston Peters is able to trifle with him, undermine him, make racist comments, make questionable comments, certainly unparliamentary comments and actions in the House, and there is no action against that,” he said.
“We challenged the Speaker today in a respectful and highly appropriate way, and yet I’m the one that gets kicked out. Proving my point, to be fair.”
He reiterated that Labour had lost confidence in the Speaker following his ruling there was no private benefit in an amendment paper that listed projects under the Fast Track bill.
…NZ Democracy is ultimately the loser here.
If Winston can make these sorts of openly racist comments in the House and get away with it when so many other Left wing politicians are punished is an insult on us all.
It has not been a good week for Winston, Gerry or Democracy in Parliament last week.
