English Bill: Urgent Debates — Setchell Inquiry—Report to State Services Commissioner 
English Bill: Urgent Debates — Setchell Inquiry—Report to State Services Commissioner 
[Volume:643;Page:13089] 
Hon BILL ENGLISH (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 I will take the call. It does seem odd to be spending time in Parliament avoiding the opportunity to speak although I would recommend it to some members.  
The question that the Government needs to ask itself today is why no one believes what the Government says about the Setchell affair. What has the Government said? Well the Minister of State Services showed himself to be totally unsuitable for the job that he has which is to develop the capacity of the State sector and to protect it from misguided political influence when he said today in the House that nothing that any of the Ministers did was wrong. If that is the case why did one of them get sacked? He said that nothing that any of the Ministers did was wrong. The politician in this House whom we are all meant to rely on as the guardian of the Public Service picked up the reports—there are two of them—read them through and came to the conclusion that nothing that any of Ministers did was wrong. That is absolutely unbelievable. Not only did Ministers do something wrong once but the reports reveal that two different Ministers did it; it happened twice. 
Then the Minister moved on to the perfect excuse that the Labour Party has dreamt up: it was the officials. We had a discussion in the select committee this morning with the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. My colleague Lockwood Smith mused over the rather startling fact that the Government believes that all its major political problems and there have been many through this term occurred because of officials. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Not all of them. 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: Yes that is right. But the rest of them with the exception of Mr Mallard’s problem occurred because of the officials and again that is what has happened today. The Minister of State Services said that nothing that any of the Ministers did was wrong that mistakes were made in the State sector and that the State Services Commission would make sure that those mistakes would not happen again. 
Let us look at what did go wrong because there is a larger question of culture that the Government has to answer. It is summed up in this question: why did the chief executive of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry a very experienced public servant consult his Minister before he appointed Ms Setchell? Why did he do it? The Minister of State Services should have explained that to us today. I will tell members why he did it. 
Hon Member 
: He made a mistake. 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: Oh it is because he made a mistake! No actually he did not. He acted in a way that was totally consistent with the culture that Labour has created around the Public Service which is “Don’t do something a Minister doesn’t want or you’ll get dealt to.” It is not just a no-surprises policy; it is a “guarantee of retribution” policy. 
So a senior public servant Murray Sherwin who has served in a range of public agencies over many years would know better than almost anyone else in the Public Service about what happens in a Public Service under pressure and he decided that he would go to his Minister before he made a staff appointment. What is even worse is that that Minister who said: “No don’t employ that person.” for purely political reasons was one of the most vigorous defenders of David Benson-Pope in this House. He knew that he had done worse than David Benson-Pope because he was consulted in such a clear manner and the email record shows he gave an unequivocal response which was then acted on in a way that was even sneakier than trying to sack an existing public servant. He is the Minister Jim Anderton who got up in this House and defended David Benson-Pope most strongly. 
Two other Ministers did things that were wrong: the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. They should have been here today apologising to Ms Setchell. It was they who said in public that she did not properly reveal her conflict of interest. This report shows absolutely without doubt that she did. The Minister of State Services has confirmed that. He said that she had acted properly. Don Hunn said it and Mr Prebble said it. Dr Cullen and Helen Clark are on record in public as accusing this innocent member of the New Zealand public of having a lack of integrity. They should apologise for it. 
In fact the integrity of this person is at the nub of the problems in the State sector. She made the mistake of insisting on her integrity. Is that not a big problem? That is the biggest mistake that was made. She said to her employer to the Public Service: “You must record that I acted with integrity.” The Public Service under Labour would not do it and still has not done it. It refuses to. It said: “No here’s the money. Go away.” That is the consistency—Michael Cullen and Helen Clark in public nailing an innocent public servant for not having the integrity to declare her conflict of interest. Public servants felt so compelled by this rotten atmosphere that Labour has created in the Public Service that they would not concede Ms Setchell the one thing she was left with: her integrity. She lost her job. She lost her opportunity to ever be employed in the Public Service. She wanted to walk away with something that does not cost a politician to recognise and they would not do it. There has been no apology from the leaders of the Labour Government who impugned her and no recognition from the Public Service which would not even bring itself to record it on a piece of paper as requested. 
This is all part of a culture that led to another public servant Hugh Logan realising just what challenges he had ahead of him. He discovered after Ms Setchell had been appointed that his department was going to be catapulted into the political front line. It is no wonder he was concerned. He knew that that meant he and his department were going to get the continuous attention of the biggest political bully in Cabinet apart from Trevor Mallard and that is David Benson-Pope—and both of them have suffered the consequences of this—as well as the Prime Minister’s office. He was going to be expected to run right through election year on the most political issue the Government had and that was sustainability. In my view he panicked. He knew he would get a bollocking from the top of the Government to the bottom if he did not get rid of Ms Setchell. Did the Prime Minister’s office ring and tell him to do it? No. It is worse than that. He knew he had to do it. That is what I mean by the culture. 
It is not the actual events on which Mr Prebble tries to hang his hat; it is the culture within which he and other Ministers are operating where they do not understand how off-track they have become. They do not understand it as was summed up by the Minister of State Services the person who should know best when he said that no Ministers had done anything wrong. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: There was no crime committed. 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: Oh that is the standard—fantastic; another Cunliffean moment! They did nothing wrong because no crime was committed! Have we not heard that before from Helen Clark? Her standard is whether an action is criminal—not whether it is right not whether it is respectful not whether it values people’s integrity and not whether it reflects the conventions of the constitution of New Zealand but whether it is criminal. And who better to articulate it than “Wonder Boy” on the front bench newly finding his straps in another Cunliffean moment? Well that sums it up: one of the bright stars said that nothing wrong had happened and the other bright star said that it was not criminal. That beautifully sums up the Labour attitude; it beautifully sums up why these simple events spiralled out of control and they will dog Labour to its grave.