I see the nice Mr Robertson has very quickly blamed the Parliamentary Council Office for the mistake in the Bill introduced into the House last Thursday and passed under Urgency providing for a seven billion dollar loan scheme which may see many of those loans never being re-payed.

FFS … even the most casual of observers know that the PCO can’t introduce Bills into Parliament.   Only a Member can.   In this case it was the Minister and it’s his responsibility to know what the Bill actually sez.

Sections of the media and their enablers have dutifully parroted the the line of defence adopted by the pinstriped dwarf … that it’s the job of the Opposition to ‘forensically examine’ any legislation and their failure to do so means they are equally culpable.     That was blown out of the water by this exchange in Parliament on Tuesday ….

Hon Gerry Brownlie Question 9 to the Minister of Revenue … Did he know that the Small Business Cashflow (Loan) Scheme was in the COVID-19 Response (Taxation and Other Regulatory Urgent Measures) Bill that was introduced to Parliament on Thursday, 30 April; if so, why didn’t he notify the Opposition that the scheme was not in the bill supplied to them that morning?

Answer … Hon Chris Hipkins of behalf of the Minister (Stuart Nash)  ‘…….  I regret that the version of the bill supplied to the Opposition differed to the one that was tabled …..’.

Just how the f**k the Opposition is supposed to ‘forensically examine’ a Bill where the matter at hand isn’t in the copy supplied to it fair beats me.

Nash is on the ‘right’ faction of the Labour Party.   He has been described as half competent against cabinet colleagues tagged at various levels of incompetence although that descriptive has taken a beating over the 1,800 ‘additional’ police fiasco and his tacit acquiescence to Maori establishing road-blocks in the North and Eastern regions preventing lawful usage of the public highways.    Half competent infers half incompetent … this latest fiasco suggests the 50% competent rating to be generous …. very, very generous indeed.     Although, to be fair, he is the scapegoat for Robertson/Hipkin’s f****p. 

Competent government … not.