Capitalist
In October 2017 a combination of the disgraceful treatment of Todd Barclay by the then PM on the one hand, and Winston installing a socialist government nobody had actually voted for on the other, meant I decided to basically ignore New Zealand politics and news for several years; I walked away in disgust from taking any interest.
Except for attending David Seymour’s election rally a couple of weeks before the last general election and finding him very impressive, I have only started taking an interest in NZ politics again quite recently, since freedom warriors marched on Parliament and Luxon became National’s leader.
By ignoring politics altogether and major changes in the composition of Parliament due to defeats and retirements at the last two general elections, it has got to the stage of being unable to – being quite serious here folks! – name more than a handful of MPs. Collins, Seymour, Ardern, Woodhouse, Mallard, ummm (trying to think of the name of another incumbent MP I am familiar with; jeepers!), oh… Grant What’s-his-name and the chap who did the coronavirus media briefings (not sure of his name, offhand, from Upper Hutt), Luxon and Goldsmith.
You get the general idea.
So imagine my surprise yesterday to receive a hand-addressed (!) letter in the mail from a woman purporting to be my Member of Parliament.
(As an amusing aside dear reader: being hand addressed and comprising my entire legal name, rather than the ‘edited highlights’ by which I am generally known, almost gave me a heart attack. Only one person ever called me that. I wondered, in a state of genuine horror, if a certain psychotic ex from a disastrous seven-month ‘marriage’ in 2006 had slunk back from Perth and tracked me down! Haha!)
Just when you thought we were living rather quietly ‘somewhere in Otago’, it turns out this is the Taieri electorate (a misnomer considering the land area it includes) and the local MP is called Ingrid Leary. Her letter welcomed me to the electorate (been living there since 1973, but thank you), before running down a list of services she provides – “…the help we can provide ranges from answering simple enquiries (we even get occasional kids’ homework questions) through to taking up cases on behalf of local residents with central and local government and other organisations…” (She gets paid for this?)
It went on to mention the addresses and contact details of her two (!) electorate offices. I must have walked past the one in Mosgiel 109 times without realising. Then a run-down of her qualifications: she seems awfully proud to be co-chair of something called the “Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians NZ Group” (I have no idea either) and her membership of the Finance and Expenditure Select Committee. (Oh! Start investigating the overhead costs of having two electorate offices!)
Her folks must find all this frightfully impressive for somebody I could not name prior to yesterday, but does remind me of Sir Robert Jones’ hilarious summing up of Labour MPs when he wrote “…at least National MPs have something to go back to” in one of his books.
Not wanting to detract from Ms Leary’s undoubtedly sincere desire to represent her constituents, it did leave me somewhat underwhelmed; good luck to her – I guess – but yes, well, don’t think I shall be bothering her during her remaining period as a temporary MP.