Labour minister Stuart Nash was not impressed with a school principal speaking out about the rollout of modems for students. Photo / Mark Tantrum
Labour minister Stuart Nash was not impressed with a school principal speaking out about the rollout of modems for students. Photo / Mark Tantrum
COMMENT:
If the Government's own level system applied to their moods, in terms of 1 being the most relaxed, I think they might be red lining at a hard 4 right now.
From kindness, teddy bears and happy dances, it appears our team of five million is not behaving itself at the moment. Mum's angry, and we're all being sent to our room. Or the naughty corner.
He was "bloody angry", he said, with Auckland Grammar's headmaster Tim O'Connor, who had the audacity to suggest that the Ministry of Education had cocked up the free modems by sending a bunch of them out to the wrong schools and the wrong families.
Nash was furious that O'Connor hadn't "come down from his ivory tower" to hop in a school van, and take those modems to a school in South Auckland. As though it was up to individual principals to solve the Government's problems and mistakes, rectify them by taking the law into their own hands and handing out modems wherever they saw fit.
The bit Nash missed in his blind fury was that the modems are labelled to individual families, they've been sent out by the ministry, they are the ministry's property, therefore individual principals are not about to go ripping off labels and redistributing modems willy nilly.
And imagine if they did? You'd never hear the end of it.
Instead, O'Connor did the right thing, he contacted the ministry to let it know about its mistake. Embarrassingly, the ministry didn't even bother to get back to him. The ministry didn't quite seem to have the same urgency about it as Stuart Nash did.
So a bunch of very expensive modems remain sitting in a cupboard at Auckland Grammar.
This hasn't been a good couple of days for the Government.
The sharp transition from smiles and hugs to disappointment and fury has left a bad taste.
Retail NZ's told it to "be kind", others are asking it to cheer up.
But this is what happens when the team of five million starts to have a few opinions of their own. Starts making a few of their own decisions. Starts pushing back a bit on what the Government had in mind.
Kate Hawkesby. Photo / Michael Craig
What the Government's experiencing is akin to parenting. They've treated us as toddlers for months; made up all our rules; told us what we can and can't do; given us handouts and asked us to behave.
Yet here we are, the team of five million, now starting to flex a bit - show a bit of teenage push back. A few snarky remarks, the odd door slam, taking the handout but not doing as you'd hoped with it.
The true test of leadership at this point is not to pack a big sad and shout at everyone, but to stay calm and steer the course.
