Post Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s cabinet reshuffle, commentators have called it both “ruthless” and “too soft”.  So which one is it? I guess it depends on which side of the fence you sit.

The fact that Ardern's actions can be viewed so vastly differently shows just how tribal and far apart the ‘factions’ are. 

Although, I thought there was one unanimously held understanding, from both camps, and that was that Kiwibuild has been an abject failure. 

You don’t even need an opinion on Kiwibuild because the numbers speak for themselves. Facts shout louder than anything else: Kiwibuild is an unmitigated flop. 

Even Ardern herself admitted it hadn’t met expectations, and that’s sugar coating it. That’s her nice way of saying, it’s a shit sandwich Phil. 

So, what one could deduce from that, is that the one glaringly obvious result of the Cabinet reshuffle would’ve been that the failed Kiwibuild policy and his poor handling of housing, would see that portfolio taken off Twyford.

Not only that, talk in the weeks leading up to the reshuffle was all about Phil Twyford. No one doubted for a second that among Ardern’s proclaimed ‘minor’ tweaks, he’d be one of them. That housing would be taken off him, that in fact the PM may go as far as demoting him out of Cabinet. 

So when the widely predicted outcome – Kiwibuild being taken from Twyford - became a reality, imagine my surprise when a commentator called it ‘surprising’. 

Surprising? Really?  I don’t think even Phil Twyford himself would’ve been surprised. The only word for it really was ‘predictable’.

But the PM was also called ‘ruthless’. Jacinda Ardern? The most empathetic PM we’ve ever seen, a woman steeped in ‘operation kindness’, the person who helmed the Wellbeing budget, the person lauded on the world stage as being sympathetic and attuned to the plights of others. The woman who wants to fix child poverty and homelessness - ruthless? 

That’s a long, long stretch. I’m not seeing it. 

Ruthless would’ve been to turf Phil out on his ear. Ruthless would’ve been to demote him and offer him nothing further. Ruthless would’ve been to take a broom to other under-performing Ministers.  That would have been the surprise. 

Because the fact she did none of those things is entirely because of who she is and how she operates. Which is about as far from ruthless as you can get.