COMMENT
Our excitement in Auckland to get down to level 2, may have been slightly thwarted at the weekend by the unnecessary panic caused by incorrect messaging around testing.
The Government's official Unite Against Covid social media channels posted a message at 5pm on Saturday night, saying everyone in South and West Auckland had to get a Covid test – even if they were asymptomatic.
Cue confusion and panic.
Queues of people waiting for tests snaked round the block. And God only knows where the legitimately Covid symptomatic people ended up in those unnecessary queues. Because it turns out, there was no need to do that, the messaging about testing - affecting about 700 thousand people - was wrong.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said at 1pm Sunday afternoon that she was "incredibly angry" about it.
But she didn't front foot it, she only reacted when asked about it. That's despite her knowing it was wrong since Sunday morning. So she might be angry, but we could well be too.
How does such a huge mistake happen?
And why did the Government not front up about it until Sunday afternoon?
Why did the wrong message stay up all that time? Even after Ardern said it was wrong and shouldn't be there.
The Government simply cannot afford to keep burning trust in their competence and their messaging.
Is it any surprise conspiracy theories and fake news abound, when people don't believe what they're being told by the official channels, because those official channels keep getting it wrong?
Who's running this show?
How can you keep banging on about your team of 5 million following the rules, when the rules keep changing?
You can't keep relying on people's goodwill, after you've locked them down, given them conflicting advice, and changed your mind on masks. And that's before we get to all the experts saying they're not sure moving to level 2 is the right idea anyway.
The all important "buy-in" from people, is waning – people are rightfully confused about level rules, masks, and as of this past weekend, testing too.
It's time the Government stopped reacting to problems, and started driving workable solutions.
We're all doing our bit, let's hope the Government and its officials, start doing theirs.
