We must applaud Ngaro for his honesty
OPINION: Alfred Ngaro is a born and bred Westie.
He was educated at Henderson High School and is absolutely committed to this community.
We are all proud of Alfred being elevated to Cabinet.
This brings significant mana to his family, his people and west Auckland.
I have known Alfred for several years and no-one can doubt his integrity, honesty or commitment to this community.
He entered Parliament as a list MP in 2011 and was rightly identified as a rising star of the party.
He represents a new face for the National Party and brings a breath of fresh air.
Alfred recently came to the public’s attention following comments he made at a National Party Congress.
It involved funding to nongovernment But Alfred went on the record to ‘honestly’ state what in effect happens to those that do criticise the Government.
He said people, like Willie Jackson, who oppose the Government’s policy and speak out against it, in effect should not bite the hand that feeds them.
This was seen as a threat to a powerful strong non-government sector.
It was seen as an abuse of power and intimidation.
Alfred must be applauded for his honesty, because that is what his colleagues in Cabinet execute in punitive ways against organisations that have the audacity to organisations. criticise their policies.
All commentators on Alfred have seen this as a slip-up, a missstep, a comment from a recently elevated member of the caucus to cabinet and accordingly a mistake by a novice.
The bizarre thing is in politics, people like Alfred get penalised for being honest.
If Alfred had lied, that would have been applauded.
Really?
Whanau Waipareira has aggressively attacked the outrageous after-hours GP costs in west Auckland.
We cannot have Westies who cannot afford this fee hiding their children or themselves away while their health deteriorates. When they do go to a hospital via an emergency ward, that costs tens of thousands of dollars.
We also object to the way the Ministry of Social Development slashes funding into our youth sector in the west.
All that does is burden our police who have to deal with a range of young criminals, who harden up and graduate to senior criminals.
The day that a nongovernment organisation bows its head and pretends these things are not happening is when we become part of a bankrupt and corrupt system.
We have suffered cuts.
Not by performance but by way of reallocation of resources elsewhere.
Alfred has a right to freedom of expression of speech, and thought.
And so do we.
John Tamihere is a former Labour Party Government minister and is chief executive of Whanau Waipareira, an Urban Maori Authority based in west Auckland.