What a rare and exciting event it was this morning to hear Phil Twyford on the Newstalk ZB breakfast show.  It’d been so long I’d almost forgotten his voice.
So when I walked into work I asked the breakfast producer how long it had been since Phil was on his programme.  He looked back on his records and by his reckoning Phil was last on the programme in February on the Kiwibuild reset. 7 months ago.
This despite repeated invitations from the breakfast show.  Most recently to answer question about the support the government can give to the retailers affected by the rail infrastructure development.
But he never comes on.  Until the day when Mike Hosking is away and Mike Yardley is hosting.
Now we don’t know whether that was purposeful.  Whether when we asked him to talk to us his press secretary asked who with and as soon as it was revealed that it was Yardley not Hosking he agreed, having not agreed for 7 months.
Whatever the truth it’s just a bad look and politics is all about looks.  The most open, honest and transparent government now chooses when and where and with whom they will be open honest and transparent with.
Meanwhile what was he saying.  Well on the compensation for the retailers we heard nothing.  He talked about material support, which means exactly what.  Financial support is still being considered and will be announced in a couple of months.  If Hosking was on he would have blown his fu fu valve.
Secondly on the procurement rules to help the struggling construction industry he was asked how it worked and he replied by telling us why it’s needed which we already know. And on it went. It was PR politician speak and it’s tiring.
So I took a  look at the new procurement guidelines on the government website.  The rules are there to support government agencies to improve the fairness and efficacy of their construction  projects.  If the project is over 50 million dollars then they have to engage with the Infrastructure Transactions Unit.
But at the end of the day the guidelines are just some guidelines.  It’s a checklist and there’s no talk about how this will be enforced or how it will stop private companies continuing to lo-ball for government work.
It’s a suggestion at the end of the day.  A very good suggestion but still a suggestion.
This is this government’s playbook.  Grant Robertson has suggested to a handful of SOEs that they mitigate the pay for their bosses.  It’s still only a suggestion.
It’s the same as Jacinda Ardern suggesting the internet companies crackdown on dodgy posts.  A very good suggestion but still just a suggestion.
I think that the government would do very well top start delivering some concrete policy rather than all these suggestions because there is a suggestion growing that they don’t know what to do
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