On the day I started high school I was plonked in a desk beside a person who has turned out to be my closest lifelong friend. We hit it off immediately: email twice a day, speak on the telephone several times per week, and they pop down here once a month for a weekend of drinkies, feasting and fishing. Like my dearly beloved they, too, are Maori and pathologically hate what socialism has done to the Maori people.
Anyhoo, between 2008 and 2017 they worked for a couple of cabinet ministers in the National Government (and – no – I am not telling you who) and have been sounded out about doing so again after the next general election.
This weekend has been fascinating. My friend has been down here on a visit; I have been reading the book “Yes Minister” by Chris Finlayson and comparing certain passages, Finlayson’s version of events, with my friend’s recollection of the exact same events. Although they didn’t work for Finlayson they were often not a million miles away from “being in the room at the time” when events recounted within the book took place.
“Oh you’re having me on; is that what he wrote?” has been a regular refrain, especially in response to such bizarre contentions as –
1. Bill English having a tight, fiscally conservative grip on the pursestrings. Remember the $16 billion deficits in 2009/10/11/12 anyone? (ring any bells?).
2. Tony Ryall getting huge ‘efficiencies’ in the health portfolio.
3. Finlayson’s noble claim he regularly recused himself when matters involving former clients cropped up (cough, splutter).
4. Gerry Brownlee’s sainthood, which nobody else ever noticed, over the Christchurch rebuild.
5. Finlayson’s lament for Wayne Mapp and Simon Power having their careers cut short – and the apparent loss to New Zealand (!) – that has resulted in. (“ummmmm…he does mean Wayne Mapp?”)
6. Anne Tolley as saint-ette: her failures as Minister of Education being entirely the fault of the teacher unions.
My friend did, however, fully concur with Finlayson’s warm descriptions of John Key, Steven Joyce, and Maurice Williamson, especially Williamson’s foresight about fibre internet, for which he hasn’t really received the proper credit.
What my friend found most hilarious, causing them to almost choke on their drinkie, was Finlayson’s claim there is watertight oversight over intelligence agencies – “four levels of scrutiny” – and “the suggestion intelligence agencies can run amok and spy on people without proper authorisation is wrong“. Enough said.
What is most enjoyable are various anecdotes about the National party of old: from the 1970s and 80s in the days before it went all woke. Finlayson is certainly correct in expressing grave concerns about whether professional politicians who have done little else in their life are serving the country well by being in Parliament. His often nasty version of events between 2017 and 2020 is something you, the reader, will need to draw your own conclusions about.
Overall “Yes Minister” is enjoyable and it’s one I’d recommend; it is more in-depth than most NZ political autobiographies and I hope others in the Key Cabinet follow suit with books of their own.