Paula Bennett – the perfect patsy
From DPB to the top table for Bennett
Twenty years ago, Paula Bennett was a teenage Maori solo mum trying to get off the DPB by waitressing at a truck stop and washing dishes at a retirement home. Yesterday, Prime Minister-elect John Key chose her as his Minister of Social Development and Employment - giving her control of welfare policy and a massive $20 billion budget. The 39-year-old National Party MP was surprised when Mr Key rang her on Sunday with the proposal - a meteoric rise for the second-term MP. She admits she may even have squealed.
We all squealed mate, for the record I like Paula Bennett, I think she’s a really decent sort and her heart is very much in the right place which is why what mACTional are going to make her do will be so much more sickening, Paula has been picked as the patsy, Key is about to ram through his and ACT’s hard right manifesto and there will be the attempt to privatize social services and the face of this privatization via stealth is going to be Paula, someone who wouldn’t willingly ever screw over a fellow NZer but will be forced to implement a privatized social services system that will not be in the interests of NZ. My prediction is that by the end of this term we will see that spark of optimism in Paula’s eyes completely dead as the rich right wing finance boys make the solo mum beneficiary do all their dirty work. Of everyone in that cabinet, I feel most for what they will make her do, if you are going to assassinate social policy, it's always good to have a friendly faced patsy with zero experience in managing $20 billion.
NZ has been conned into believing National are change and moderate.
posted by Bomber @ 7:03 am
14 comments
14 Comments:
I think NZers are really digging this government. Would love to see the approval ratings early in the new year.
Whether its moderate or not, i guess is relative. Being from the far left Bomber, you think its extreme. Being someone who busts their arse every single day at work, with a centre right position i think its very moderate. By international standards, its very moderate.
That is incredibly patronizing Martyn. When Helen Clark took on Social Welfare in the 80's her only experience was as an academic and Labour Party suck-up. Paula Bennet has clawed her way up out of the poverty trap that the intellectuals of the left prefer to keep those less clever than themselves in.
When has a Welfare minister been ranked as low as 16th in the Cabinet?
Bomber is forgetting history once more LOL.
So far the daddy state is rocking on. At least we have someone who isn't a white middle class intellectual ie like bomber going in there to rip shit up.
Of all the new ministers, 11 of them entered Parliament after the last National govt and of the nine who entered previously, only six have been Ministers before.
Even if you insist on clutching at the straw that the "change" was anything but a change from Labour to National (and you seemed to have convinced a few people including yourself that this was the case), the new cabinet line up shows considerable change.
Compare that to Labour who have had 80's throw backs on their front benches for the last 9 years and are now led by two people who were part of the Lange Labour govt in the 80s.
Funny, thats what I thought when I saw her on TV this morning - she is either being set up to fail or she is going to become such a liability she'll be the first of the cabinet to be sacked.
Bomber an intellectual..lol
It was interesting to hear her having to respond to a question about something Key had said, on Nat Rad Morning Report this morning. The Key quote was about some solo parents on welfare "breeding for a business". She danced around it, saying it was a quote from quite some time ago. She then side-stepped the Key approach, and talked about how difficult it is for a solo parent on welfare, and that it's not something anyone would choose unless they had no other choice.
Bennett also said that she wanted to counteract welfare dependency, which she put down to people not having enough confidence to go out and do stuff for themselves.
Then she was asked about cutting beaurocracy in her portfolia areas - gee, she's got difficult issues to balance, trying to help those on welfare who she seems to care about, while trying to deal with the razor gang.
I'll be interested to see how she deals with all thses conflicting pressures.
Funny that when she was a solo mum on welfare, she was a Maori. Now that she's going places there's not much mention of her Maoriness.
Possible outcomes:
1. National's policies will work and Paula Bennett will reap the rewards.
2. National's polices will fail, Bennett is the patsy if they do, and National will have burnt off yet another promising female MP.
3. There will be some successes and some failures and history will call the winners and losers.
Option 3 usually takes it.
Nationals won't have it all wrong. They won't have it all right. How far off they are, we will all find out soon enough. They do appear to have some capacity to learn from history - as a group - though some individuals in that caucus appear to be well below the average.
Their intention to allow private business people to review government function may be a big mistake. I well recall what happened last time....and you'd think the Nats would, too. Maybe they do. Again, we'll find out.
Ok ok
Intellectual pretensions
Satisfied now.
Lets not forget that altho Paula Bennett is Maori and has been on the DPB and is by some accounts a thoroughly nice person, she joined the National Party! She could have joined any of the other parties but she joined National! That says a lot about her personal beliefs and attitudes.
Lets not forget that altho Paula Bennett is Maori and has been on the DPB and is by some accounts a thoroughly nice person, she joined the National Party! She could have joined any of the other parties but she joined National! That says a lot about her personal beliefs and attitudes.
Thanks for that concise and insightful comment. A persons beliefs can be deduced from which political party they join - whoda thunk it!!!
How could the decision to join the National Party be seen as rising above anything ? pond life perhaps?
Post a Comment
<< Home