To Put It Bluntly

Tactlessness has its place; the trick is in knowing when tact is needed.

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Gareth Morgan didn’t make it to Parliament, but the Gareth Morgan School of Confrontational Persuasion seems to be here to stay.

It hasn’t quite plumbed the depths reached by the founder of The Opportunities Party, who called one of his candidates a pain in the arse, described Winston Peters as “an Uncle Tom”, and dismissed various Twitter critics as idiots, doormats or nutty. But, Thursday’s Budget rhetoric aside, there’s a growing practice among ministers to be as boorish as possible towards particular sector groups – to the point where one begins to suspect there’s some sort of prize pool.

We’ve had Shane Jones telling bureaucrats they’re menaces who’ll be drop-kicked if they keep getting under his feet. David Parker’s threats to double proposed water charges, disenfranchise Nimbys and de-cow the dairy industry without compensation, are the mark of a politician out to do things to people rather than for them. Clare Curran has slighted the IT sector by re-advertising the new job of Government tech adviser because she says “Christmas busy-ness” meant no one good enough applied the first time.

Now there’s Iain Lees-Galloway, who says employers who can’t afford to pay staff living- and minimum-wage increases should expect to go out of business. He styled this as the business taking “the opportunity to transition” – meaning, transition out of business.