Maharey Steve: General Debates 
Maharey Steve: General Debates 
[Volume:610;Page:7232] 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 There was I think in the words of Winston Peters a palpable and demonstrable excitement amongst the few remaining National Party members at the prospect of the recent National Party conference. After the election loss in 1999 the dumping of Jenny Shipley the dawning realisation that the brat pack as it was called moved too early the election thrashing in 2002 horrible polling leadership rumbles from Gerry Brownlee and the new Mogadon man Don Brash the conference looked like an opportunity for the National Party to get together and maybe to start again. But proving that even in the age of the decriminalisation of prostitution the National Party could not organise a good time in a house of ill-repute it all went wrong. 
Striding into the midst of the celebrations like a demented morris dancer came the lowest-ranked National MP bells clanging and handkerchiefs waving. Night after night on the television Maurice Williamson pointed out that the National Party was going nowhere and that the No. 1 issue for the National Party conference was to find out the reason for that. National Party officials were stunned. How could Maurice Williamson do that to them? How could he not dance in uniform round the maypole with the rest of them? The National Party might have been wondering why Maurice Williamson acted as he did. The rest of us were wondering why the National Party did not fix that matter before the most important conference in 30 years took place. 
Why did it not fix it? After all Maurice Williamson has constantly criticised the National Party. From his lowest-possible position in the National Party after he was demoted he has told National that it was not doing well and this is what he said: “I haven’t criticised Bill English. I’ve talked about the fact that we need to deliver a performance that the public sees as credible.” He said that English lacked “excitement charisma humour personality or talent” and what is wrong with that? He described the National Party as being like the  
Titanic 
: “I’m yelling. Will somebody tell the orchestra to shut up? Will everybody get on deck and man the lifeboats? I am not prepared to sleepwalk to defeat once again having done just that the last time. I guess”—speaking of Bill English the leader—“he’s the 2000 equivalent of Bill Birch. You vitally need people like that in the team but there’s no way you would have thought that Bill Birch would be a leader. Bill was about as boring as watching paint dry and that’s probably a bit unfair on the paint.” 
Those kinds of statements were summarised by Maurice Williamson’s electorate vice-chairman John Upton who said: “Maurice doesn’t suffer fools gladly.” Linda Clark the interviewer asked him: “You mean Bill English?”. John Upton said: “Well yes that’s exactly who I mean.” One would think that if one were running the National Party and somebody who had been demoted to the lowest-possible position in the National Party had been frequently saying those kinds of things one would get alongside him or her and ask to sort the matter out before it got to the conference. But the National Party did not do that. Maurice Williamson arrived at the conference National did nothing and it turned into a farce. 
Mr Brownlee and Mr English were screaming at Mr Williamson the soon-to-be-defunct women’s branch moved a motion of censure for the not-yet-put-in-place board to carry out Mr Williamson was threatened with being cut off from being in the party and the whole thing looked as one person said in the media—and with great sympathy in my heart I say this to my friend Mr Power over there on the Opposition benches—like one was watching a slow-motion train wreck take place over that whole weekend. It was like watching a slow-motion train wreck. 
Members on the Government side of the House just watch Simon Power and the National Party in amazement. We watch them in amazement as they continue to unravel without being able to break out of that. The National Party is now a fiction. As Mr Williamson said National members are irrelevant. They stand for nothing; they have no policy. Their constituency has gone to New Zealand First to United Future and in the case of the central part of the constituency to Labour. That leaves them being no Opposition at all.