This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up.
In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to confuse a 25% rates increase, largely driven by the Government canning Three Waters, with their claims that they’ll reduce the cost of living. A message that merited flushing, not consuming.
Jack began by talking about Simeon’s role as Transport Minister and asked him what possible downside there might be in having variable speed limits outside of schools. A nice patsy question to start, on one of Simeon’s initiatives.
C’mon Minister it’s really easy - it’s dead, or injured kids. That’s the downside, but then what price do you put on getting to your destination 30 seconds earlier?
According to young Simeon there is no downside. Which theoretically is true provided every child arrives and departs school at the specified times. As for those who don’t, well I suppose in Simeon’s view if they get taken out crossing the road, it probably just raises the school’s grade point average.
Come on Simeon, every kiwi learns - the faster you go, the bigger the mess.
But ff a kid gets bowled on the way to school, and it’s not yours… does it even matter? I don’t imagine Simeon’s kids will be walking to school, any more than Dr Shane’s kids are smokers. Those are other people’s kids, so that’s their responsibility, right?
Jack repeated, “so, just to be clear, as Transport Minister you think there are zero downsides to having variable speed limits outside of schools?”
Somewhere in Simeon’s sentience a thought surfaced that this might not look quite as good as he’d imagined. He said it was about having a balanced approach. By which I assume he meant that you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.
Jack tried again, leading the Minister in the direction of a little human compassion. Sadly Simeon was saving any pretence of that for church later in the morning.
He was utterly focussed on how quickly cars could get by schools. To be fair he is the Minister for Transport, not the Minister for Children - and boy did it show.
Jack changed tack given that the plight of injured or dead children didn’t seem to catch Simeon’s interest. He asked instead what the productivity gains would be?
If there was any analysis showing gains the Minister was keeping it to himself, and he just rattled out the same prepared lines about needing to improve traffic flows and keep safety measures to particular times to do so.
Then there was a smile on Simeon’s face. A thought occurred, as it does seemingly to all members of this government - let’s blame the last lot!
If in doubt say it was all Labour’s fault. Simeon suddenly became very smug, which isn’t usually a good look, but on this occasion it was exacerbated by the fact that he was smirking over changes that will inevitably lead to children getting hurt.
Jack said that Auckland Transport (AT) had done the analysis of how much time was lost due to lower speed limits. The smile disappeared from Simeon’s face as the existence of actual analysis was not something that would necessarily support his blanket, baseless statements.
So he attempted a common trick of Ministers who want to avoid a truth that disagrees with their statements, saying, as they alway do, that there is a range of information.
Very important to say there’s a range. It means that you’ve set the expectation with the less quick witted in the audience that other research exists that supports the alternate reality of your position.
He said range about four or five times, as if the repetition would make the existence of alternate data somehow more real.
The finding from AT was that the difference, for an average trip, was 15 seconds. Which seems to me like a reasonable investment of time in order to keep kids safe when they’re crossing the road outside a school.
When did being better safe than sorry stop being a thing?
Jack switched to the cost of Simeon’s roads of making National significant. Reminding the Minister that when he was on the show during the election campaign he’d checked repeatedly with him that his costing allowed for inflation. At that time Simeon had brushed away concerns, saying he’d taken an economically prudent approach to costings.
Jack asked whether when NZTA (Waka Kotahi) checked Simeon’s costings in November, after the election, they found them to be accurate?
Can you guess which word Simeon started using again? It starts with an ‘R’. That’s it - there are a range of estimates. Of course there are.
Then he started talking about needing a range of funding and financing tools. In case you’re not following, what the Minister is saying is I got the numbers wrong, now we need to privatise.
The only thing that’s ambiguous is whether Simeon was either incompetent, or dishonest, with his pre-election numbers. Although I suppose both would also be a possibility.
Range Range Range.
Valiantly Jack again reminded Simeon of what the question was. He said, “despite all of the concerns that were raised during the election campaign, the scrutiny that was put over your costings, and the questions about properly accounting for inflation. When NZTA costed your projects did they find that your costings were accurate?”
Simeon: “well they presented a range of what those costings would be”.
Jack: “did they find that your costings were accurate?”
Simeon: “Well there was a range of estimates for each of those different projects.”
Jack: “Did their range find that your range, because you also put forward a range, did they find that your range was accurate?”
Simeon: “The reality is there have been cost increases in Transport Infrastructure”
Hmm, yes Jack did mention inflation. But in any case we’re talking about the difference between pre-election estimates in October and NZTA costing them in November. There can’t have been much of a cost increase, how much are talking?
Simeon prattle on about consenting, which was all well and good, but completely irrelevant in terms of why the costings might have changed. That process was a known fact and should have been included in his numbers.
The Minister had absolutely no intention of answering the question whatsoever. Why should he be accountable? He continued to talk unrelated nonsense over the top of Jack’s attempts to get him to answer.
Tame at this point resorted to telling Simeon “I understand what you’re trying to do, I understand what you’re trying to do”, in response to his silly behaviour.
“You said you’re the party of fiscal discipline, the party of economic prudence, we’ve got this right. So if you just take the average range of NZTA’s costings versus the ones that you took to the election, how inaccurate were you?”
Range, Range of estimates Siemon blathered. Tame should’ve ended the interview and said if you’re not going to answer a basic question, what’s the point?
Simeon started talking about different consents that were in progress, which was entirely irrelevant. It was like watching a politician appear on Seven Days, you know when they’re not allowed to say “yes”, or “no”. Except in this game they’re not allowed to actually provide any answers to questions.
It went on and on with Simeon smugly ginning. He was on top of his game - no way was he going to give an actual answer. He said range a few more times for good measure.
The interview became unwatchable, there wasn’t even any pretence any more that Simeon would actually participate.
Things reached a stalemate as Jack repeatedly said “How many billions of dollars short were you?”
In the end the Minister wouldn’t say the number, and so Jack had to say it for him. It was 16 billion dollars.
Fuck me that’s a lot of money! That’s a lot of free prescriptions, a lot of equipment for diabetic children, a lot of public servant jobs, and a whole lot of school lunches.
Jack was curious as to how they might pay for such an enormous shortfall. He was too polite to mention it, but the truth is our Finance Minister, Nicola Willis, is already dealing with a very significantly sized hole of her own making.
I’d had enough at that point. I felt sorry for Jack, imagining the interview carrying on to discuss Three Waters and the weasel words that Simeon would offer on that.
People like Simeon, and Nicola Willis, have seemingly no interest in being answerable for the numbers they took to the election. Costings that were wildly inaccurate, either as a result of gross negligence or outright lies. They have no compunction to answer the media, or questions put to them in parliament - and now that Gerry Brownlee is the speaker they don’t have to.
You’ve been lied to New Zealand. The revenue for the Tax Cuts was never there, the costings for roads - complete bollocks.
The government doesn’t care, they won the election and they’ll spend the next few years blathering about ranges safe in the knowledge that the public fell for it and think they’re going to improve the cost of living. Not merely siphon funds off to give people like landlords billions in tax breaks.
Ever get the feeling you’ve been had Aotearoa?
Bravo Nick - at your brilliant best and Simpering Simeon his usual despicable, slimy self. Cant watch\listen to them, [my dogs think I'm shouting at them lol], so very grateful you doing it for me.
Simeon is such a weasel. Jack is excellent at drilling down but Simeon, like his boss, only knows word salads. He doesn’t give a damn about citizens, about children, about the disabled. Only cares about the wealthy and easing their alleged tax burden. It’s so disheartening and we have three more years of undoing and imposing hurts that are undeserved. Unfortunately to be a politician in this government compassion must be kicked to the curb.