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The Soap Box: Changes afoot at top of Labour, NZ First

Author
Barry Soper,
Publish Date
Tue, 31 Oct 2017, 5:42AM
Both Prime Minister Ardern and Deputy PM Peters have shaken up their staff. Photo/Getty
Both Prime Minister Ardern and Deputy PM Peters have shaken up their staff. Photo/Getty

The Soap Box: Changes afoot at top of Labour, NZ First

Author
Barry Soper,
Publish Date
Tue, 31 Oct 2017, 5:42AM

The rubber's hit the road in the Parliamentary precincts and the stench is overpowering, particularly for those who a fortnight ago were clinging on to hope, and that's not just the politicians.

They're outnumbered by bureaucrats and those who were hired from civvy street.

The Beehive has arguably one of the biggest newsrooms in the country, former journalists all spinning on behalf of their ministers.

National's ministerial press secretaries have been given their marching orders while the new lot shoulder tap others to take their place.

Meanwhile the new Prime Minister's chief of staff, Neale Jones, who took the role under Andrew Little, plans to leave his current job but says he is still considering a new post in the administration.

Also, Winston Peters' chief of staff David Broome has moved on.

Peters has now moved into the Deputy Prime Minister's suite on the seventh floor of the Beehive.

The cleaners, after the rip roaring dance party thrown by the Westie Paula Bennett on the night Peters turned his back on the Nats, must have worked overtime to get it back in shape for his occupation. 

Today amid the chaos Labour MPs will meet for the first time in National's old caucus room before Ardern's new Cabinet meets formally on the Beehive's tenth floor for their first down-to-business meeting, and there's plenty of that confronting her Government as the requests to make good on the promises made over the past few months flood in.

The Nats seem to have given their MPs another week off, or maybe it's too raw to be meeting in the Labour caucus room that they haven't seen for almost a decade.

Other than Bennett's office, the unsafety of the Beehive referred to by Peters has nothing to do with sudden changes of fortune for those who occupy it.

More than 30 years ago Legionnaires' disease lurked in the water tank in the bowels of the building.

When David Lange occupied the ninth floor he thought he may have contracted it but as usual made light of the disease actually being in the building saying, that apart from a few of his caucus wets, he presumed that few would spend much time in the water tank in the basement.

Risk factors include being over 50 and being a smoker - so clearly Peters has moved in at his own peril.

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