Below the Beltway

The climate change minister is putting New Zealand on the world stage at the COP 23 climate change summit in Germany, delivering a message that ‘‘being small’’ doesn’t absolve New Zealand of responsibility when it comes to lowering emissions.

Paul Eagle: The MP for Rongotai gave a powerful and emotional maiden speech which brought his colleagues and those in the gallery to tears. Eagle, who was adopted and has adopted his own son, creatively used the speech to read a letter to his young son about how he wants to make it easier for adopted children to meet their birth parents.

Amy Adams: Her proposed amendment to the Government’s paid parental leave extension to allow parents to choose if they take some of the leave together didn’t get across the line, but it gave National a popular platform in a week of headlines mostly sucked up by Labour.

DOWN

Kelvin Davis: In his first full week as acting prime minister, Davis struggled to get through media conferences and got caught out not being across portfolios in Question Time.

Stuart Nash: The police minister made promises he couldn’t keep this week when he announced in a radio interview that the Government would add GST to purchases from overseas. Turns out the finance minister is only looking into it.

Golriz Ghahraman: The Green MP accidentally sent an email meant for a colleague to the media suggesting the Greens should engage in horsetrading with Labour to try to get a national ‘‘Parihaka Day’’ in exchange for their support of the Government’s ‘‘waka jumping’’ bill.

QUOTE

‘‘I think he’s enthusiastic. Enthusiasm is an excellent thing in a puppy but probably a minister needs to be a little less.’’ – National’s Judith Collins responds to Revenue Minister Stuart Nash jumping the gun on an internet shopping tax.