Govt needs to lift cone of silence

Labour’s honeymoon is coming to an end – and the social plight of our most vulnerable Kiwis is at the top of it’s to-do list.

THERE’S a moment in the 2008 movie Get Smart starring Steve Carell that surely has been playing out in Parliament for the past few weeks.

It’s when Carell’s character Maxwell Smart finds out at a work meeting that he is to finally get his wish of becoming a fullyfledged secret agent.

It’s the fulfilment of a life-long dream but Smart doesn’t want to look too excited in front of his colleagues, so he requests a ‘‘Cone of Silence’’ to be lowered over him.

However, he fails to activate its normally soundproof shields and so everyone sees and hears him excitedly scream to himself: ‘‘I’m so happy! I’m so happy! This is the best day of my liiiiiiiiiiiife!’’

Our parliamentarians are all adults and professionals, but surely some in our new government have recently been allowing themselves such a moment.

It can’t have been easy for them for nine years, sitting in the stink seats of Opposition and facing a party that seemed unbeatable under their old leader John Key.

It must also be a bit weird for the people who run the government’s various machines of power. Three months ago most would have expected to be going into 2018 still working for English, Joyce, Bennett, Brownlee, Bridges and Co.

Instead, government staffers have been busy preparing briefing documents for their incoming bosses.

This is a chance for a new government to be able to point out the mess they inherited, but it also makes for interesting reading. For example, I looked through the 25-page document the Human Rights Commission prepared for the incoming Justice Minister Andrew Little, so you don’t have to. You’re welcome.

In New Zealand there is no central system for recording and collating details about crimes motivated by hate, which makes it difficult to establish the scale and extent of these crimes and how to deal with the issue. The report says ‘‘unless these events are captured and analysed, the day-today victimisation experienced by people because of their ethnicity is largely invisible’’.

New Zealand continues to rank very poorly internationally when it comes to bullying in schools, and initiatives over the past five years have not improved these figures. Immediate investment is required in ‘‘ready to go’’, evidence-based, targeted bullying prevention and response programs beginning with pilot programmes and then scaling them up.

The commission is concerned about impacts of secondary stressors relating to unresolved insurance claims, faulty repairs and land compensation on the mental health and wellbeing of people in Canterbury. Canterbury District Health Board figures show demand for child and youth mental health services has risen 73 per cent since the earthquakes.

And then there was this little beauty: the prevalence of substandard housing conditions in New Zealand has developed into a ‘‘major human rights issue’’ with multiple effects on health and wellbeing.

Although I will never get the two hours of my life back that it took to read the report, it wasn’t all grim reading.

The commission believes discussions with the largest banks, developers, community housing associations, trade unions and others suggest a ‘‘coalition of the willing’’ wants to help achieve the goal of everyone in New Zealand being adequately, safely and affordably housed by 2030.

No pressure then. And with all that in the new government’s todo basket, they will have time for only a quick Christmas break before it’s time to throw away the Cones of Silence and start knuckling down to the hard work.

It can’t have been easy for Labour for nine years, sitting in the stink seats of Opposition and facing a party that seemed unbeatable.’