Wolves circle Uffindell
Luxon leaves underfire Tauranga MP to face the music in front of the media
National’s Christopher Luxon has effectively thrown his new MP Sam Uffindell to the wolves — and it may well end up saving him. After the news broke that Uffindell was kicked out of King’s College after beating up a third former when he was 16, Luxon told him to get out and front on it.
Uffindell was told to do every media interview he was asked for. The clear message: clean up your own mess.
He did them all and he did them alone, radio, television, websites, newspapers, saying over and over he was a teenage “thug” but was a changed man as an adult.
Then he was sent out to front a press conference yesterday morning where he took questions for a full 20 minutes until there were no more.
It is a move straight out of the Shane Jones’ Playbook for Penitents.
When Jones was caught with porn movies on his hotel bill, he did just that: a woeful figure who fronted time and time again, self-flagellating and issuing choruses of mea culpas where’er he went.
It is a sink or swim scenario: if you stuff it up, you sink. If done right, it is convinces people you made a mistake and deserve another chance.
It is not easy to execute — especially for a new MP, as Uffindell is learning as he tries to convince people the sins of a 16-year old him are in the past. The news blindsided Luxon, who first heard about it on Monday morning, just before the story broke on Stuff.
Luxon was quite right to say he should have been told earlier. He was also right that the delegates who selected Uffindell — and the people of Tauranga — should have been told.
If there is a chance something bad is going to come out, it pays to advise the leader so they can be judicious in what they say — Luxon sang
Uffindell’s praises blind through the byelection and after.
It is not clear whether Luxon blames the party or Uffindell for keeping him in the dark. Uffindell has said he told the Tauranga selection panel, and from then it was up to them to deal with it how they saw fit. Nobody, including MP Todd McClay who was on the selection panel, saw fit to tell Luxon — who said his expectation was for candidates of good character, integrity and competence.
So Luxon had no appetite for making excuses for Uffindell.
He said Uffindell had work to do to rebuild the trust of the Tauranga voters, and he would have been horrified had it happened to one of his own children.
He did not stand with him when Uffindell emerged to speak to the media: Uffindell came out with only the party’s whip, Chris Penk, who stood silent throughout.
But Luxon is a Christian: “I believe in giving people a second chance and forgiveness,” he said at one point.
It would also be disastrous for National to have to force a new MP to step down — and the cost of another byelection.
Uffindell will now have to wait to get reselected by National again for the 2023 election.
It may well be considered unfair for the party to drop him in the next selection for his sins as a 16-year-old — after all, he did disclose it and the party selected him, warts and all.
The only thing that’s changed is that the voters too now know of it.
Uffindell has also now admitted he bullied others, but would not expand on that beyond saying there were times he tackled or engaged in “rough and tumble”.
He has assured Luxon none are as serious as the King’s College case. So far the only other one to emerge was a three-day suspension from St Paul’s Collegiate for sneaking out to a party.
If more cases come out or examples of more recent bad behaviour emerge, Luxon will not be so forgiving.
It is a sink or swim scenario: if you stuff it up, you sink.