King Mike & Mike King.
A good week for coalition enthusiasts.
I built a time machine to see you again
To hear your phone call
Your voice down the hall
The way we were back then
We were dancing in the rain
Our feet on the pavement
You said I was your second head
I knew exactly what you meant
In the country of the blind, or so they story goes, the one-eyed man is king. This week an especially one-eyed man was crowned king. Again.
For many years the mighty Hoskinator has ruled supreme in the morning radio slot with his vacuum of truth. Provided of course that you ignore the commies over at RNZ. Some years they have more listeners but they don’t count because that’s state-funded, socialist radio.
My mention of the country of the blind proverb was not to suggest that Hosking, or his audience, have eyesight difficulties. Beyond their inability to see the bloody obvious.
And any of you sniggering about a certain activity purported to diminish eyesight can just about blimmin well stop it - as Rik from the Young Ones might’ve said - right kids?
Nor was I talked about them being one-sided, this is ZB that’s a given. No, I was referring to the mental faculties, the thinking stuff, the grey matter. In the land of the witless, the half-wit is king.
Is that a bit harsh?
Perhaps. Truth is Mike is not stupid, he knows exactly what he’s doing. He creates an alternate version of the world based on exaggeration, omission, and inaccuracies. A platform that disinforms and distorts so that people make their decisions based on his creation, rather than reality.
The previous government is painted as being profligate spenders, wasting taxpayers’ money on an army of backroom bureaucrats, or as an authoritarian regime who overreacted to a virus that just needed to run its course.
Whereas, more objectively, they were a government who spent money during a time of crisis to keep people safe and protect jobs so that the effects we saw on businesses elsewhere didn’t run through our economy resulting in large scale unemployment.
They were a government that didn’t always get it right, responding as they were to a developing situation. But they had a mandate to put people ahead of profits in the form of a stonking great victory in the 2020 election.
But people listened to Mike and went into the voting booth thinking the government had borrowed and spent recklessly and wastefully. Seven months later he’s still beating that drum.
Ignoring the reality that thanks to the outstanding stewardship of Grant Robertson we went into Covid well placed compared to most and exited similarly, despite having to spend a lot of money. Our debt levels coming out of the Covid period were comparable to similar countries going into it.
Inevitably there are efficiencies that can be made, but there’s nothing like the waste suggested. Come on, you’ve interacted with our public services. It’s not people sitting around drinking cups of tea, it’s under resourced services doing their best to deliver what people need.
I’m aware that I harp on too much about this, but the thing is if people can’t start from a point of reality then how on earth are they going to make sensible decisions?
Last night I watched the following clip which shows the polls in the US and the sorts of things voters believe, even when they’re the opposite of reality. It made me think of the constant barrage of misinformation here. All you hear these days is that Labour overspent and were wasteful and nobody seems to question whether it is true, partly true, or mostly bollocks.
By the way the answer was - C) Mostly Bollocks.
The clip shows that the majority believe the economy is in recession and shrinking - it isn’t. 49% believe the S&P is down for the year, when in fact it’s up by about 13%. The same number, 49%, believe that unemployment is at a 50 year high, despite the fact that it’s at a near low.
The presenter summarised it - “we think the economy is shrinking when it’s actually growing, that the stock market is down but it’s actually up, and that unemployment is at a 50 year high when it’s actually at a 50 year low.”
We wonder how people go into the voting booth and make the decision that they do - well, this is how.
Tell people it’s raining and they’ll vote for umbrellas and end up sunburnt. I suppose we should be grateful that Mike isn’t telling his listeners that members of the opposition have actually died and been replaced by clones - no doubt many would be open to such a suggestion.
That’s why King Mike matters. He defines the reality for his audience that informs their voting decisions.
There was another Mike who was king this week. His name, conveniently, Mike King. While everyone else was being told to cut spending the coalition magically managed to find Mike King $24m for some positive headlines, and to maybe help some people.
I’m sure that beyond politics this is driven by a desire to help people but I suspect it was his name rather than his results that secured the funding for Mike.
A little publicity is always handy:
I’m not going to be a hypocrite, I think people that receive public funding should still be able to speak out about their concerns and needs. They’re the ones at the coal face.
I don’t care who Mike votes for, I just think it's a bit rich that he put the boot into Labour when he didn’t get everything he wanted and now he smiles nicely for the coalition while they do less for Mental Health.
With some trepidation I posted the following:
David said, “Lost all respect for him after his ridiculous antics during Labour's term”. Dorothy was more circumspect saying, “to start with Mike King was doing good work but I'm afraid he has allowed himself to be captured by political expediency.”
I’d agree with both of those views, as well as that of one former MP, who shall remain nameless, who succinctly said, “He is a fucking idiot”.
Juliet offered - “Another chapter of this government’s policies modeled from The Emperor’s New Clothes. Mike King is willingly first in line for the catwalk so we can all see his new outfit.”
Peter pointed out, “This is pretty much just a poll/vote grab on behalf of Winston. Outsourcing to a private contractor and to hell with funding mental health via Te Whatu Ora.”
So why are the government doing this, if not for the publicity? Well the funding was the brainchild of NZ First. Their agreement with National specifies that the coalition will, “Fund Gumboot Friday/I Am Hope Charity to $6 million per annum”.
It’s just the sort of gimmick they like. “Don’t worry about the fact we’re cutting funding to things like the Suicide Prevention Office - we’ve got Mike King on the job”.
Similar in a way to Winston’s views that all the solutions to our current race relations issues can be found in the writings of people like Sir Apirana Ngata. I’m sure Sir Apirana was a very fine man, but he died in 1950 which hardly makes him qualified to hold a view.
Yesterday there was an interesting article by Paula Penfold in Stuff, which took a look at Mike’s gumboot charity.
The summary at the start of the article states:
On Wednesday it was announced the I Am Hope charity founded by Mike King will be funded $24m over four years to provide counselling services.
The now-chair of I Am Hope donated $7,000 to the National Party in 2023, and $20,000 in 2020.
Board member and recently-departed CEO Troy Elliott sought National’s candidacy in Botany in 2019.
Questions are being asked about the charity’s close ties with National, and whether there was enough transparency over the contract process.
Naomi Ballantyne, who has donated $27,440 to the National Party in recent years, said “I am just so grateful ... for the Government supporting such an incredible organisation. I am humbled by the work that Mike and his team do, and delighted that this money will help them do more.”
Labour Mental Health spokesperson Ingrid Leary said, “Is this how NZ works now, rich people can donate a few thousand to get their charity a big contract and small community organisations don’t get a look-in? It’s tin-pot politics that makes a mockery of fair process and creates mistrust in our democratic systems.”
In fairness to Ms Ballantyne she has only been in the role a short time and she told Stuff she had no influence over the decision. So I guess we might have to look at who the previous chair was. Ah yes, our old friend Sir Ian Taylor - remember him and all the things he had to say about the last government?
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I’m sure Mike King started out with fine intentions and has done some good. No doubt many who have listened to him have been inspired. On the other hand none of those statement are relevant to King Mike.
What the two men have in common is a tendency to malign Labour while promoting the parties of the coalition government. When you consider how outraged the coalition has been at anyone who receives public funding criticising them it’s a tad ironic that they’ve given this money to Mike King.
King Mike on the other hand works in the private sector, so he can say whatever he likes, and his listeners will believe it - and vote accordingly.
And that’s how people like these get elected.
You might have heard a more up tempo version of this song, but it’s well worth checking out this one:
Gumboot Friday is a flawed and dangerous model. Only two sessions are funded and young people can chose a counsellor from a list for those two sessions (and counsellor can charge what they want). Counsellor need not have, and probably won't have, any specialist skills with young people. Two sessions not enough to build a relationship, trust or even start to deal with trauma. But young person has to pay for any future sessions at market rate. Can apply for extra paid sessions but that requires lots of confidential information about young person being given to some GBF management. Mike King not known for ethical use of info about young people, and readily uses personal information in his PR. Model is a huge risk to young people and counsellors. Impact Lab assessment is all about data and takes no account of real people or needs, so would not understand how risky it is to just fund two sessions and then stop.
The thing that really gets me is that there has been no evaluation by this government about which mental health programmes for children are based on proven therapeutic approaches and have shown long term results for kids. Maybe Mike King's organisation has this evidence at hand but so do other programmes that also weave parents into the work they're doing with the kids and include a broader community approach. I haven't quantitatively researched which organisations get the most sustained results and I'm damn sure the government doesn't have this information either (given how the process went, as described by Mike King on RNZ this morning - it was NOT robust). Programmes like Brainwave Aotearoa Trust and Mitey are two that come to mind that would have much more effective long term results.