There were two immediate signs this week that things are changing in the way Covid-19 is handled, post-election.
The Government response to an unsourced outbreak began early and fast under the control of super-minister Chris Hipkins; and the National Opposition resisted any temptation to pile into the latest situation- David Seymour's Act has assumed that task.
Hipkins is impressive and one of Jacinda Ardern's best. He is both an excellent manager and communicator, as was reinforced yesterday after the Auckland CBD alert.
There was no question that Ardern had to keep his temporary job in charge of the Covid-19 response in her post-election reshuffle last week.
The only questions she had were how much of Health he should cover (none), as well as Covid-19 and how much of Education he could hang on to (all).
It is not yet clear that she made the right decision to split Health away from Covid-19. That will depend on whether the new lines of accountability make it harder or more complicated for Hipkins to practically deal with cases.
And it is not yet clear whether it will be harder or easier for Hipkins to get on top of under-performance in, for argument's sake, mobile testing units, or contact tracing, or the Auckland Regional Public Health Service or some other area of the health system vital to the Covid response.
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins at a press conference with director general of health Ashley Bloomfield and sign language signer. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Andrew Little as the new Minister of Health must also have some responsibility but how it works in practice will be a challenge.
Both ministers will have to ensure that the major health sector restructuring that will be taking place after the Simpson review in no way constrains the parts involved in Covid-19.
The response to the CBD cases may not have been faultless but to get a mobile testing unit to the apartment block the same day as the test result is a vast improvement on what happened three months ago when the first post-lockdown case of community transmission was detected.
And it was with some relief that Hipkins announced yesterday he will get Cabinet to approve compulsory wearing of masks on all flights in New Zealand and on public transport in Auckland.
Every case of community transmission represents a failure somewhere. The Government insists that failures are inevitable, which they are not. Last century it was assumed that airline "accidents" were inevitable.
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins, centre, with (from left) Health Minister Andrew Little, and Associate Health Ministers Aupito William Sio, Ayesha Verrall and Peeni Henare.
Act treats every failure as though it were a catastrophe but the public has a fairly well-calibrated sense of what constitutes an avoidable failure from makes an unacceptable failure.
The transfer of the virus on a pedestrian crossing button, for example, may be avoidable but acceptable. But the transfer of a virus from a sick worker who went to work while awaiting a Covid test would be avoidable and unacceptable.
Hipkins has made no obvious errors. It is a safe assumption that National will have a finer calibration of its response to future outbreaks under its new Covid-19 spokesman, Chris Bishop.
National MP and Covid-19 response spokesman Chris Bishop. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Bishop has made his mark in every portfolio, most recently in transport and infrastructure, which leader Judith Collins has now given to her finance duet, Andrew Bayly and Michael Woodhouse.
Bishop is not yet out of the dog-box for instigating the Todd Muller leadership coup but he is still one of National's best operators. Bishop has only ever known Opposition as an MP. He is so good at finding and prosecuting weaknesses in Government that he should have been a contender for finance.
Finance does not need accountants, as Collins argues. It simply needs people with equal doses of political nous and intelligence who can learn quickly. Grant Robertson on a bad day will be more than a match for Bayly and Woodhouse.
Bishop has been given a vitally important role in shadowing Chris Hipkins, a role that could cross over into health, managed isolation, vaccines, testing, when to open up the border, tourism and the economic response.
