Lawmakers on both sides of the House keep our democracy alive

“Throughout the time that I have been involved in this, I have heard a lot of different suggested responses to what we should be doing— we should close the border completely, depending on who you listen to on any particular given day. Never mind the fact that that would send all of our exporters to the wall, that our health system would grind to a halt because medical supplies would stop coming into the country and the carnage that would cause,” he said.

“Who suggested that? Name one.” – David Seymour 

“Some of the epidemiologists who are quoted by the members opposite have argued exactly that— and it would do untold damage to New Zealand. Then, on the other hand, the next day we will get a claim from the Opposition saying that we are being too restrictive, that we are not moving fast enough to open up to the rest of the world,” Mr Hipkins said.

Opposition for continual improvement 

Of course, the other Parties get a crack as well – or more than one crack depending on their size. First was National Party’s Chris Bishop, who took a different tack from the ACT Leader.

“ I want to acknowledge that the government has done a good job generally in responding to Covid-19, and we should be proud of that as a country. To use the language of the Prime Minister, the team of 5 million has done a good job and we need to acknowledge that. But we can do better, and it is not sacrilegious or treasonous to point that out. In fact, it is in the public interest to try and seek a better response from government. That is the reason we have a democracy and that is the reason we live in a society governed by the rule of law.”

 
National Party MP Chris Bishop in the House (Photo ©VNP/Phil Smith)

Saiva Testing to be regular

After demonstrating that the Opposition does not need to be absolute, Mr Bishop pointed out areas of response that he would like improved – particularly the regular use of saliva testing for border workers, an issue that National have concentrated on all week.

“The argument is pretty simple, which is that it is less invasive, because you are not shoving a thing up your nose, and it is quicker and it would mean that you could scale up very quickly and do much more testing than you are currently doing. At the moment, in the case of the most recent case, these workers are subject to fortnightly testing. If you could do daily testing, that would mean better identification of risk at the border and better identification of cases,” Mr Bishop said.

Key role of Parliament

And to close off his speech he gave a summary of a key role of Parliament generally and the opposition. It was the second time he’d noted that in this speech. 

“So, to summarise, the government has done a good job and they should be congratulated, but that does not mean they cannot be better. Our job in Opposition is to make them better, and we are going to continue to push home on things like saliva testing and ask more questions about this most recent case. We owe it to this Parliament but, most importantly, we owe it to New Zealanders to ask the tough questions to make this government response better,” he said.

During the general Debate on Wednesday (February 17), he repeated and expanded on this defence of the role of the Parliamentary Opposition. This emphasis may illustrate the difficult path oppositions tread during a crises, when public sentiment is high, public trust of government is raised, and opposition can be seen as against the common good. 

Greener side of appreciation

His speech received an ovation of sorts from the next speaker, Green’s Julie Anne Genter.

“Really excellent speech from Chris Bishop, I really agreed, particularly in the beginning of the speech, with his recognition that New Zealand’s government had done an exceptionally good job in responding to Covid-19 and acknowledging that is the role of everyone in Parliament, and the media: to raise questions in a reasonable way to ensure that we have the best possible response.

“The Green Party agrees with, and supports, the Labour government’s decision to move into Level 3 in Auckland and Level 2 for the rest of the country on Sunday, following the news that there were new community cases,” she said.

Green MP Julie Anne Genter at a Select Committee Meeting (Photo ©VNP/Phil Smith)

But Ms Genter had not only taken her gloves off to applaud.

“It is just difficult to take seriously Mr Seymour’s criticism of the Ministry of Health when he was a part of a National-Act government that actually oversaw a huge reduction in the number of public servants, the disestablishment of the Public Health Commission, absolute just slashing of any investment in public health in order to be able to fund tax cuts for the wealthy,” she said.

Insight into decision-making

As well as the fisticuffs, a debate over a specific policy decision can sometimes allow a little insight into decision making. On this occasion from Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Grant Robertson.

“These are not decisions taken lightly. We debate them. We look at the public health advice that we are getting. We weigh it against the consequences of, for example, asking people in Auckland to stay home, asking businesses not to operate, restricting the operations of businesses in other parts of New Zealand by moving to Level 2 for those. We have developed a great deal of knowledge of this over the last period of time. For example, the question of balancing the economic consequences with putting in place these kinds of restrictions and the health benefits of that, and the economic benefits of that, is something we come to learn. We stand by the view that the very best economic response to Covid-19 is a strong public health response,” he said.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Grant Robertson (Photo ©VNP/Phil Smith)

Roadblocks in the North

These kind of policy debates can also get surprisingly specific. National’s Deputy Leader Shane Reti, speaking as a Northland-based MP, complained about the placement of roadblocks in the North.

Also speaking locally and arguing for stronger lockdowns was Te Paati Maori’s Debbie Ngarewa-Packer who said that Taranaki should have been given the respect of being placed at Level 3.

Is there a Doctor in the House?

The current Parliament is pretty unusual in the level of medical expertise.

Lawyers and farmers are very common backgrounds for MPs. Health professionals are rare. In this Parliament, National has a former GP and a healthcare manager with training in counselling, while Labour has the unprecedented grouping of four doctors, a nurse, a midwife and a psychologist.

Between them they could probably run a respectable health clinic.

That kind of background knowledge is incredibly useful in Select Committees where the nitty-gritty of laws are debated, but it is also useful in the House, especially at the moment.

Dr Reti is a GP, and his background knowledge often adds to debate.

During the urgent debate, he considered the pros and cons of saliva testing.

Mr Bishop earlier noted the advantages.

National Party Deputy Leader Shane Reti (Photo ©VNP/Phil Smith)

The Duology of testing

Therefore, we quote Dr Reti’s completion of the duology. His points, while fascinating, also illustrate a potential downside of an expert – that for completeness they may raise facts that weaken your case. But this is Parliament where getting the right solution is more important that winning the debate.  

“Clearly it works. I have got no question with that. Arguably, the sensitivity may be less: some of the enzymes in the mouth can degrade the virus; you get less viral load in saliva. It is actually quite tricky in the laboratory as well, and it does not do well with dilution. There are other issues actually getting it as well: you are not allowed to eat, chew, or smoke, for 30 minutes beforehand. So yes, I understand all of that, but what I heard from across the House today was that it is an infrastructure problem. Yes, we cannot pool samples; I get that; but this is, sort of, news to us, where we are relatively happy to throw money around, and suddenly we are hearing an infrastructure hurdle which we had not heard before,” he said.

Infectious Disease Specialist explains

Associate Minister of Health Ayesha Verrall spoke for the Labour Party.

She is a former Infectious Disease Specialist and took some time explaining how public health teams logically work through hypotheses to discover who caught the virus first and how.

Labour MP Ayesha Verrall (Photo: VNP/Daniela Maoate-Cox)

“The most important thing to understand is that the germ does not just spread by being in the same general area as the person; being in a workplace that is connected through its business to the airport is not enough to say you have a plausible link to international cases. Instead, we must be able to establish the mode of transmission. The worker who was ill was a laundry worker. As Professor Michael Baker has said in the media recently, there has not been a single documented case of transmission through the laundry,” she said.

Ms Verrall described the process of discovery, including the ins and outs (so to speak), of sewage testing.

“But I will stop there before someone objects to puns with a ‘point of ordure,” she said.

The above Report has been sponsored by