Nicola Willis calls in Public Service Commission following Commerce Commission tweets on ‘Joe Biden’s Gaza Genocide’

Another public service board chairman is in trouble for potentially breaching neutrality guidelines on social media, with Public Service Minister Nicola Willis saying she will “follow up with the Public Service Commission” about Commerce Commission chairman John Small’s tweets about Israel’s invasion of Gaza.

Small has tweeted (or posted to “X”) a number of times about political issues, most recently concerning Israel’s invasion of Gaza. In January, he retweeted a post from Marxists.org, which compared one of the antecedents of Israel’s governing party to the Nazi Party.

He said “Recommend!” in the re-tweet of the link. The post was an open letter from a number of Jewish intellectuals including Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt published in the New York Times protesting the visit of Menachem Begin, the founding leader of Israel’s freedom party, to the United States in 1948. Begin went on to found Israel’s Likud party, which is currently in government, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has prosecuted a bloody war in Gaza, leading to the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians.

The letter said the party was formed out of a “terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organisation in Palestine” and alleged the party was “closely akin in its organisation, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties”.

The authors noted that earlier that year, “terrorist bands” aligned with the party had attacked a “peaceful” Arab village, killing civilians. The 1948 Arab–Israeli War that led to the birth of modern Israel saw the deaths of thousands of Palestinians and the displacement of hundreds of thousands more.

Small told the Herald he would engage with the Public Service Commission.

“The focus of today is on our final report into competition in the personal banking sector. Should the Public Services Commission choose to undertake a review I will welcome that and engage with them positively,” he said.

Willis said she did not agree with the tweets.

“I haven’t looked at the tweets in detail. I would note that what is critical is any personal views don’t impact on the ability of a public servant to do their job,” Willis said.

“Those aren’t comments that I agree with,” she said of the Nazi comparison.

In November, Small re-tweeted a post giving an undiplomatic backhand compliment to French President Emmanuel Macron over his belated support for a ceasefire in Gaza.

“Emmanuel Macron, who had a leading human rights activist banned from the country for saying that there was racism against Arabs and Muslims there, has now decided that Joe Biden’s Gaza genocide has gone too far. That’s how bad things are,” the tweet, which was written by another account, said.

Another tweets weighed into subjects like Aukus and race relations in New Zealand.

The country has been embroiled in a fractious debate over public service board chairs’ freedom of speech since last year when Health NZ chairman Rob Campbell was sacked over his LinkedIn posts. He was later sacked from the Environmental Protection Authority.

The episode brought on a long debate over the meaning of public service neutrality.

Thomas Coughlan is deputy political editor and covers politics from Parliament. He has worked for the Herald since 2021 and has worked in the Press Gallery since 2018.