The winners and losers of the inaugural Scrutiny Week

Friday, 21 June 2024

Labour health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall grilled Health Minister Shane Reti, during Parliament's Scrutiny Week, about the Government's promise to deliver new cancer medications.

ANALYSIS: That’s a wrap. After 134 hours of hearings, the first Scrutiny Week is over.

Parliament is trying out this new “Scrutiny Week” thing as an attempt to provide greater accountability of Government departments and ministers. It is normal for ministers and senior officials to front to select committees over time, but Scrutiny Week meant all those meetings happened during the same week - with extra time for some hearings.

To the surprise of no one, it wasn’t 134 hours of great times nor 100% great discussion. But there were some enlightening moments.

Lowlight: Patsy questions

Scrutiny Week isn’t just an opportunity for the Opposition to hold the Government to account. Backbenchers from the governing parties also sit on select committees. Many of those MPs asked some pretty pointless questions this week - eating up time that could otherwise be used to hold the Government to account.

These questions, known in Parliament as “patsies”, end up wasting everyone’s time.

One such example kicked off the week on Monday, with National backbencher Tom Rutherford asking Finance Minister Nicola Willis to list the Government’s nine public service targets.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon made a huge deal out of announcing those targets back in April, so if his own party need help remembering them - he’s got a serious problem.

Nicola Willis was asked a blatant patsy question, wasting time during a Scrutiny Week hearing.

Highlight: Scrutiny of Government’s cancer promise

Health ministers were under pressure to explain what had gone wrong with their promise to fund an additional 13 cancer medications.

Through questioning by Labour’s Ayesha Verrall, Health Minister Shane Reti revealed there had been no Budget bid to fund 13 promised cancer medications because they’d run out of time to work out how to implement it.

There were a range of issues with the policy, including that Pharmac - the drug buying agency - is meant to act without influence from politicians.

Reti said there would also be an infrastructure issue, if the drugs were funded all at once then they’d need a lot of staff and facilities to distribute them.

Verrall said these issues had been clear for a long time.

'Yet, you persisted with this manipulative and cruel promise you did not intend to follow through on,' she said to Reti.

Stuff understands the Government could, within the next week, announce its next step for delivering those promised cancer medications.

Lowlight: No scrutiny of the Serious Fraud Office

The Police and Serious Fraud Office appeared before the Justice Committee in a double-header event with their minister Mark Mitchell on Thursday, but the entire 90-minutes was consumed by questions of the police.

Serious Fraud Office director Karen Chang was acknowledged only twice during the hearing, during introductions and then at the end when Mitchell thanked her for her work.

It was a shame, because it was a waste of Chang and her officials’ time but also because that department is deserving of scrutiny.

Police Commissioner Andrew Coster and minister Mark Mitchell said police would look to spend less time on mental health and family harm in the future.

It was asked to find savings through the Government’s cost savings drive, and we are none the wiser as to what impact those cuts have had.

Highlight: Insight into police plans to withdraw from mental health work

But sustained questioning of Mitchell and Police Commissioner Andrew Coster did glean insight into their thinking about what jobs the police should no longer be doing.

Coster and Mitchell said too much police time was being taken up responding to mental health call outs and family harm issues where there was no risk of violence.

Mitchell said he was working on a plan with Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey to establish an emergency response system for mental health incidents, so police wouldn’t need to spend as much time on those incidents.

And with family harm, Mitchell said he wanted another agency - perhaps MSD - to manage family issues where there was no risk of violence. He said police were not always the best suited to respond to family harm and mental health incidents, and that social or health workers would be better equipped.

Coster said police would continue responding to emergencies where violence or harm was likely.

“Indications of a risk of violence would mean they dispatch a police car,” Coster said.

Mitchell said delays at hospitals meant it was common for police officers to spend a night waiting with mental health patients in triage areas.

For the environment…

Scrutiny Week included dire warnings for native animals, with Conservation Minister Tama Potaka saying it may be unaffordable to prevent the extinction of every local species. He said he could not promise that it would be possible to save every species.

“We have to be very mindful that that comes at a cost which up until this point in time no one has figured out,” he said.

Meanwhile, Environment Minister Penny Simmonds said there would be limited funding for other environmental protections.

She said she would “rebalance” the Government’s environmental focus.

A light: Racing Minister Winston Peters

Acting Prime Minister Winston Peters became an animal psychologist on Tuesday, when asked - given he is the racing minister - about whether greyhound racing should be banned.

“Dogs love racing. Watch them in the wild. Just like horses. Three o'clock in the morning, everybody's quiet and they're out there having a race in the paddock,” he told the committee.