PM Christopher Luxon speaks to the media from Levin
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters on Wednesday said he doesn’t have “dashboard crap”, mentioning the likes of quarter-year or 100-point plans.
He’s since told the Herald he was referring to dashboards produced during the previous Labour Government, but wouldn’t provide his opinion on the quarterly action plans produced by the current Government, of which he is a senior member.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said on Thursday of such action plans that he was “proud of the way they work because they focus the public service and they focus the Government”.
Asked about Peters’ comments, Luxon said: “No disrespect, Winston is following the quarterly action plans very, very well.”
Peters made the remarks on Wednesday after being asked on The Platform whether he thought New Zealand First had had a year of delivery and achieved what it had set out to despite not having a 50-point plan.
“I don’t have this sort of dashboard crap that I see other people perform on and a 50-point plan, or a 100-point plan, or a quarter-year plan,” he said.
Winston Peters doesn't have "dashboard crap", he says. Photo / Mark Mitchell.
Peters, the Deputy Prime Minister, said his party would soon release a list of “things we quietly achieved because some talk and some do”.
Asked by the Herald on Thursday why quarter-year plans were “dashboard crap”, Peters said: “I was in a Government with Labour circa 17-20 when they had dashboards every month.
“I thought to myself, this is ridiculous, it is all the sort of presentation and hype you put out there when you haven’t got substance.”
When the Herald reiterated he had also mentioned quarter-year plans, Peters said Labour also had those.
So are the current Government’s quarterly action plans “dashboard crap”?
“Well, you have heard my view. We are out there to get jobs done, not to put dashboards up and not get things done.”
Asked whether his coalition partners were those who “talk” or those who “do”, Peters said: “I think you should go back to the fact that people are looking forward to Christmas, they are looking forward to a substantive holiday, and they are sick of the type of crap that is coming from the mainstream media every day.”
The Government has been releasing action plans each quarter listing what it expects to accomplish over the coming months. For example, in September, ahead of the fourth quarter, the Prime Minister released a statement saying the next action plan would be focused on infrastructure. It also released a 100-day plan last November after the Government was formed.
The political parties that make up the Government frequently put out press releases or social media statements speaking about the progress they are making on their priorities.
Peters' party, for example, said in March on its website: “New Zealand First has achieved a significant body of work as laid out in our 100-day plan and we look forward to continuing to progress our work plan even further during this term.”
Asked why quarter-year plans were important for the Government, Luxon said: “We are trying to turn New Zealand around and when you are doing turnaround you have to be very, very focused on what you are going to do, what you must do, versus the nice-to-do”.
He said the public service and the Government need to be given “focus” and he was “proud” of that.
“They have given us tremendous ability to say, right, we have done 160 actions I think over the last 12 months, we have 43 to close out before the 31st of December. All of those actions are designed to do three things: rebuild the economy, restore law and order, and deliver better health and education.”
Labour deputy leader Carmel Sepuloni said she believed there was infighting in the Government – though the Government has said all parties get along well.
On the “dashboard crap” comment, she said: “That seems to contradict the Prime Minister, who as a CEO loves his quarterly reporting and his dashboards and his targets.”
Jamie Ensor is a political reporter in the NZ Herald press gallery team based at Parliament. He was previously a TV reporter and digital producer in the Newshub press gallery office.
