Apology to Handley over tech job
Any suggestion that entrepreneur reapply for the role had not been discussed No correction but damage still done
Digital Services Minister Megan Woods has apologised to entrepreneur Derek Handley over the way his recruitment for the government Chief Technology Officer role unfolded.
Woods confirmed she had spoken to Handley yesterday.
“I gave Mr Handley a phone call just after midday today. I apologised. As the Prime Minister said, this clearly hasn’t been a good process. I apologised for the impact this has had on him and his family,” Woods told reporters.
She said she didn’t apologise to Handley for the delay in contacting him but explained to him why that was.
“Clearly this was a process that got incredibly messy.
“We’d already seen a resignation from a minister, that we made an assessment that we wanted all communication with Government to be through officials,” she said.
Any suggestion of Handley reapplying for the role had not been discussed.
Woods said she asked for more time to review the role. She said Cabinet had signed off on the scope of the role but by the time it was offered to Handley it had expanded.
“My advice from DIA that I received when I became minister was that it had increased quite a lot from the original job description.”
Woods earlier misspoke when she said there was a confidentiality agreement with Handley over the settlement he received over the handling of the role.
A spokesman for Woods said she had received incorrect advice from the Department of Internal Affairs, and as a result, misspoke when she responded to reporters’ questions on the issue earlier yesterday.
Woods was speaking to reporters after Handley released a tranche of communications between him and former minister Clare Curran, and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
He received a payment of $107,000, which will be donated, after he was offered the role by Curran in August when she was Digital Services Minister, then the offer was withdrawn after she was sacked as minister.
Curran yesterday said it was Handley’s right and his choice to release the information.
“I think it’s good that it’s out there.” Curran said she and the Government were “working through” releasing the information themselves.
“With relation to the Government’s process, it is a different process and there are other responsibilities and obligations, and one of the obligations that I had was to respect the process with regard to him.”
She denied that it was embarrassing for Ardern.
“No, I think this is part of what happens when there is a controversial issue and transparency is actually occurring.
“I would like to make the point that the State Services Commission found that the process of the recruitment was very robust and the meeting I had with him in February did not prejudice that process.”
HFor video go to nzherald.co.nz It is becoming a habit — for the second time in three weeks, National leader Simon Bridges has accused Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern of misleading the public.
This time she has also been accused of misleading Parliament as well as the public and Bridges has demanded she correct her statements.
Ardern put up a strenuous defence on both counts that there was no need for corrections.
In both cases she was technically correct that she did not tell a lie, but in both cases she omitted information that gave an impression that turned out to be wrong. It is becoming a habit.
The recent allegation is that she gave Parliament the impression she had received only one text from erstwhile Chief Technology Officer [CTO] Derek Handley, when in truth, thanks to Handley’s own disclosures, she had received seven.
Simon Bridges in the House: Has she had any conversations, emails or text with Derek Handley since she’s been Prime Minister?
Jacinda Ardern: My best recollection is that I received, some months ago, a text from Mr Handley mentioning the Chief Technology Officer role, which I do not recall directly engaging with, as that would not have been appropriate.
Jacinda Ardern also gave Handley her private email address when he said he wanted to send her his “start thoughts” on the “CTO thing” back in April.
He did not actually email his thoughts to Ardern until June 7 which is when he also revealed he had applied for the CTO job. And as she has told Parliament, she did not respond to the email — not even by emoji — even though he told her he wanted to help her whether or not he got the CTO job.
Ardern has also given the impression in Parliament that Handley was a passing acquaintance when in reality she had texted him to say it was great news he was returning to New Zealand (he had decided to do so before applying for the CTO job) and said: “Let’s catch up when you’re back for good perhaps? In the meantime I’ll talk to the team about how we can make use of you and your kind offer [to help and support her in any way possible].”
And he texted her “how’s mumhood?”
Acting PM Winston Peters swore blind Ardern was blameless of anything and everything. True, she will not have to correct any answers she has given to Parliament. But even if she did, it would not undo the damage she has done to herself.