Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins. Photo / Mark Mitchell, Pool, File
Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins. Photo / Mark Mitchell, Pool, File
EDITORIAL:
It was an extraordinary moment in extraordinary times.
Covid Response Minister Chris Hipkins told RNZ's Checkpoint on Wednesday the Government was considering giving Aucklanders allocated times to leave the region over the summer holiday. This, he said, might help reduce traffic at checkpoints while vaccination certificates are being checked.
"It might be that people get allocated a time in which they can travel," Hipkins said. "We haven't made that decision yet. It's an option. We're just working through what the practical options are to ensure that we don't end up with people spending days sitting in their cars."
Across the nation, time stopped, mouths dropped open and ministerial staff scrambled to turn off phones and set emails to out-of-office. The Leader of the Opposition pricked up her ears and reached for a press release template.
Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson quashed the prospect of it the next day. "I can't see that happening," he granted, "it wouldn't be very practical."
That this extraordinary suggestion even passed Hipkins' lips when he knew he was "on camera" tells us several things.
One is the pressure he must be under in his roles of Leader of the House, Minister of Education, Public Service and the Covid Response. He has been one of the more solid Labour ministers and this brain-fart didn't even require a sniff test.
One other inevitable conclusion is the situation in Auckland has become a difficult impasse for the Government. It promised the city - locked down now for 82 days - will have a "classic Kiwi Christmas" but still has little idea how to achieve that without setting the virus on the rest of the country.
The Government has painted Aucklanders into a corner and cannot let them out without tramping Covid-laced footprints everywhere. Each solution being devised only poses more questions.
Another assumption to draw is that the Cabinet discussions each Monday on the next moves in the Covid response must spitball some eye-popping ideas.
Unauthorised people have already crossed into forbidden lands with light traffic levels and fulltime police cordons in place. Attempting to dictate when eligible people can go on holiday deserves to be laughed out of town.
