Adams AmyHon AMY ADAMS (National—Selwyn): I move That the House take note of a matter of urgent public importance.The removal of a Minister has to be one of the most serious instances that this House can deal with. Ministers are placed in a position of incredibly high trust and respect. They hold positions that are critical to New Zealand and New Zealand quite rightly expects our Prime Ministers to ensure that standards that are fair for a person holding that role are met. In this instance we are left with the overwhelming impression that this is increasingly a Government where secrecy and questionable standards are the order of the day. There is nothing about the removal of Meka Whaitiri that answers questions; there is everything about it that leaves more and more questions unanswered. This Parliament and more importantly the people of New Zealand deserve to know what is going on. This is happening far too often. It is particularly concerning because in this instance what we do know is that the incident—and we've heard a lot about an incident and that's all frankly that the Acting Prime Minister today would reference; that's all the Prime Minister would reference in her press conference. An incident occurred but we do know it involved a staff member. What is clearly apparent from putting together all of the comments that have been made is that this involves allegations of at the very least bullying and at the worst violence and assault. If we're talking about a Minister laying hands on a staff member that is incredibly serious and that speaks right to the heart of the standards in this Government the standards that the Prime Minister should expect from her Ministers. But so far we've had nothing. We've had no proper statement of what happened. We've had no proper statement from Meka Whatiri. We've had no apology to the staff member concerned and it's become apparent to me today that it is now quite clear to many people that we're talking about a staff member who ended up with bruising. Now again the Acting Prime Minister is refusing to make those sorts of confirmations but I would suggest the public of New Zealand deserve to know if we have Minister of the Crown laying hands on a staff member to the extent that they end up with bruising. That is a fundamental expectation and I would have thought it would be 101—not frankly just for a Minister; not even just for a member of this House; but as a human being. You do not go around laying hands on other people to the extent that it leaves bruising. No doubt speakers will get up on the other side and deny all sorts of things but here's the thing: this is a Government that has refused to give any information whatsoever. Hon Paul Goldsmith: Meant to be the most open and transparent—Hon AMY ADAMS: Exactly. My colleague Mr Goldsmith makes the point that I was just going to say. How often have we heard this Government and this Prime Minister say this will be the most transparent Government ever? That is becoming laughable. Frankly that suggestion is now a mere mockery when it is made. It is an utter joke. And the reality is that this is quickly becoming one of the least transparent Governments New Zealand has ever seen—one of the least transparent. And it's even more egregious because they hide it under a veil of pretty words. They say the right things as if they care they want to have compassion and kindness and have a new standard but every one of the dirty dodgy questionable actions leaves us thinking that that simply isn't true. It isn't just Meka Whaitiri. Unfortunately Meka Whaitiri is just the latest in what has become quite a long list for a Government that's been in office for such a short time. Look at their response to the Labour sex camps. The report was buried—SPEAKER: Order! Hon AMY ADAMS: No one was allowed to see it.SPEAKER: Order! Can we have a—[Speaker makes narrowing gesture]Hon AMY ADAMS: The response to Meka Whaitiri is reminiscent again of the actions we saw with the dismissal of the last Minister Clare Curran. This is relevant of course because it speaks to the way the Prime Minister is holding her Ministers to account. Instead of coming out with fulsome information putting the facts out on the table matters are being forced to be dragged out one by one and Ministers only accept them when they're forced into some sort of disclosure. We've seen that just today with the Derek Handley emails and we're seeing it again in this case. Rather than an open fulsome explanation of what happened with this Minister what happened with this staff member and what happened in Gisborne on 27 August we're seeing dodging weaving ducking diving and refusal to answer basic questions. Now the Prime Minister has taken three weeks to get to this point three weeks where we've heard no apology to the staff member—very little mention of the staff member actually; it's all been about what's fair to Meka Whaitiri and what the Prime Minister expects the way she would be treated. What about that staff member who we now know has been left bruised? Well we do know that in those three weeks the Labour Māori caucus went to see the Prime Minister and lobbied very extensively for Ms Whaitiri to remain. Yet when the Prime Minister was asked in her press conference about the sacking about this very matter she said—when asked whether she was lobbied by the Labour Māori caucus—No" she said. "No I wasn't." I heard that very clearly. It was one of the few times we've had a clear answer and now we know that indeed she was. She was lobbied by the Labour Māori caucus but even that it seems—now that the report has at least gone to the Prime Minister—wasn't enough to save her which tells me that the matter is an incredibly serious one. I would expect a Prime Minister who wants to hold herself out as being open and transparent and caring about people would be upfront with the people of New Zealand. It's a pretty simple expectation for a Prime Minister who wants to be treated as if she is going to have kindness and compassion and is going to put transparency at the head of her agenda. She clearly is not.The question now of course remains this: what happened on 27 August in Gisborne? Hon Member: We don't know.Hon AMY ADAMS: We don't know. What we do know is that while there is a report it's not going to be released. What the Prime Minister has said is "That report can't be released. There will be a version of it released once we've had a chance to"—I'm now paraphrasing—"sanitise it." Once a sanitised report has been prepared that works for the Government's narrative that might come out but I can tell you right now it won't tell us what happened in Gisborne on 27 August. That is not acceptable conduct. That is not what we would expect to have happen. It is certainly not transparent.Now of course the question is well why should Meka Whaitiri be fit to stand as a member of Parliament? Why should she be fit to remain as a member of Parliament? Do you know what occurred to me when I was thinking about the parallels here? We had a member on this side of the House a younger member of the House who was accused of a minor criminal offence—never proven but he was accused of it. He was hounded out of this House by those members of Parliament who said it was unacceptable for relations with a staff member to have even a hint of impropriety. It was totally unacceptable for Todd McClay—Todd Barclay; sorry Todd—for Todd Barclay to stay as a member of Parliament. Well what do we have now? We have Meka Whaitiri accused of assaulting a staff member leaving we understand bruising on her. Assault—members of the Government if you've forgotten—is a criminal offence. So I ask the members of the Government: on what planet is it OK for a member who assaults a staff member to remain as a member of Parliament when Todd Barclay for the offence of taping a staff member which he didn't know was an offence—for that to be totally unacceptable to remain even in this House? What a double standard. What an utter double standard. It seems to me that the Prime Minister has utterly outsourced her responsibilities in this regard. The Prime Minister decides whether she has confidence in her Ministers. Every Minister serves at the privilege and the will of the Prime Minister. If the Prime Minister loses confidence in a Minister they're gone. On this side of the House I can tell you if any one of us at any point in time lost the respect or the confidence of John Key or Bill English we were gone. Neither of them would have ever outsourced it to Ministerial Services to decide whether the Prime Minister has confidence. It is not a question for bureaucrats to decide whether the Prime Minister has confidence in a Minister; it is a Prime Minister's responsibility. All we heard from Jacinda Ardern was "It's not up to me. Ministerial Services will decide." Well I'm sorry Prime Minister but that's not good enough. It is not good enough to outsource your judgment to Parliamentary Service to Ministerial Services—to a pack of bureaucrats. Those bureaucrats do their jobs well—I have no issue with them—but they are not a substitute for the Prime Minister of New Zealand. And now we are having a Prime Minister who is outsourcing and abdicating her responsibilities to a process within the corridors of the bureaucracy. That is not what New Zealand thought they were electing. That is not what New Zealand thinks of as a Prime Minister.It isn't good enough to have now a member representing Ikaroa-Rāwhiti a member chairing the Labour Māori caucus who is accused of assault in this House. It is not good enough to say "We'll decide that without giving the public and the Parliament the information on which to make their decision." It's not a big ask. When you are Ministers in this House you know you're accountable for everything you do. You should expect to answer questions. You should expect to be challenged on your behaviour. You should expect to be upfront. The Prime Minister should be expected to be challenged and questioned and held to account on what's happened. This side of the House and the public of New Zealand are not going to take an answer of "There was an incident. We've looked at it. End of story." That is not good enough. And today in the House we had the Acting Prime Minister thinking it was good enough to simply bat it away with an unconcerned flick of his hand saying "There was an incident. That's all you need to know." Well I'm sorry Mr Peters. That is not good enough. It is not leadership. It is not the standard we expect of our Government. And Ministers on their $300000-plus a year packages should expect to be held to account and they can expect that we will not accept allegations of bullying abuse assault violence of any form to be in any way acceptable. They're not acceptable for a Minister they're not acceptable for an MP they're not acceptable for a New Zealander. This side of the House is not going to let this Government continue to get away with obfuscating denying the public information trickery and frankly being dismissive and contemptuous of the processes in this House where we hold the Government to account. Time after time Ministers are refusing to answer questions refusing to front up about meetings only admitting to things piece by piece as they're dragged out and admitted to. In this case of Meka Whaitiri you can bet it will be the same. Unless the Government is shamed and forced into releasing the information you can bet we won't find out the true story. Well actually the people of New Zealand are going to expect better. They're not going to want a Minister of Customs an Associate Minister of Agriculture an Associate Minister of Local Government an Associate Minister for Crown/Māori Relations—important roles. These are important roles and the public expects people to hold those roles who are honest who have integrity who have principles and who treat others with respect. Respect—it's not a big word; it's not a lot to ask. But nothing we have seen from this Government nothing we have seen in the way the Prime Minister has treated the accountability processes nothing we saw today from Winston Peters in answering questions and nothing we've managed to piece together from the scant little information we've been given about this shameful affair speaks of respect for the people of New Zealand or speaks of respect to this House. I think very quickly New Zealand is going to tire of being treated like little children who don't deserve to know the truth. That is what we're seeing. We are seeing time and again a patronising parental—Hon Member: Arrogant!Hon AMY ADAMS: —nanny State arrogant Government from a group of people who clearly did not have the knowledge the competence or frankly the morals and values to hold the roles that they now hold. We can disagree on policy. We get that. We understand that in this House: we will have a view; they will have a view. We will debate policy. But we will not—and the people of New Zealand will not—accept Governments who deceive who hide who obfuscate who dodge who dance on the head of the pin who split hairs who play semantics who think they are so arrogant and so much better than everyone else that they don't need to be honest. That is not the sort of New Zealand that New Zealanders want to see. For a Minister to sit at home for three weeks on full pay while the Prime Minister "um'd" and "ah'd" about whether she still had confidence in this Minister is outrageous. It is outrageous for a Government to have—twice now in two weeks—lost a Minister in circumstances that make it clear that the Government has no standards. They will only move if they're forced into action. The Prime Minister is not sure when she should sack anybody. She couldn't even bring herself in the end to sack Clare Curran—poor Clare Curran had to fall on her own sword in the end because the Prime Minister couldn't do it. And only when a report made it impossible for the Prime Minister to not act did she finally take any action on Meka Whaitiri. If that is the standard of this Government we're in for a long next couple of years as New Zealanders see through the gilt and the glamour and the pretty words and see behind it to know that what we have here is a dodgy decrepit immoral Government that won't hold itself up for accountability that won't stand up to be judged that won't be honest with the public of New Zealand that won't put information out and let people judge for themselves. That is not a Government—SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired."