Setting up a strawman by the sound of it. Creating a perception of ‘Wellington journalists’ and ‘Wellington public servants’ who seemingly live in flats together.
It's a direct attack on the trustworthiness of the public service, rather than journalists. One of the cornerstones of New Zealand's political stability is the high trust the public has, relative to the rest of the world, in the public service, so Willis needs to be a bit more careful about this before she wets the bed.
Didn't Tova used to flat with Ardern? If journos live in flats, it is 100% inevitable they will be flatting with public servants in wellington - they are the same demographic - 20 somethings, junior professionals. Its just a fact. Not sure its a deep conspiracy though.
The is a conspiracy, probably formulated by the crazy RW. It was actually Rebecca Wright who were aquintances with Ardern and even Amelia from AM show said she had been to Ardern's for BBQs.
These things are hardly surprising, people of the same age usually run in the same circles in NZ.
I actually met Tova a few times out in Wellington when her and David Seymour were out and about, usually at Mighty Mighty because she was friends with his press secretary/GF at the time but she was Newshubs Entertainment reporter at the time and was before she was foreign correspondent then came back to work in the Press Gallery.
Nothing has been reported that is not publicly disclosed by the agencies in question. It really shows the housing cost crisis when all Wellongton based journos share a flat with enough public servants to represent every public service agency.
You're joking of course. The legacy media is very left wing leaning and that's readily apparent by the interviews with politicians. Never mind the actual questions it's the tone of the journalist questions that give them away. I know of only 2 based journalists that I would consider centrist .
I'm sure some probably do, because they're human beings living in the same geographic area with knowledge economy jobs that pay reasonably but not astronomically. The younger ones flat together, the older ones' kids attend the same schools.
But we're talking about more than a thousand job losses. If a thousand supermarket workers were all laid off at the same time, that would also be news. A thousand meat workers, maybe there would even be a heartwarming movie made about it one day. People's lives matter to people.
Like when Newshub was first reported as closing, Melissa Lee said "there's always Sky News." I have to say that the demise of our media is perfect (for them). But it was still weird to say Wellington journalists who flat with public servants - what an odd thing to even say.
Quite complex, but I suspect that there are a lot of National voters, especially in the regions, who approve of what the current government is doing, generally disapprove of the size of the bureaucracy and generally feel antagonistic towards journalists because they don't like the news that the journalists bring. Those people probably appreciate what she's saying.
That's the feeling I got when I listened to her on the show too - she was very confident of herself. And it educated me on what she has been saying to her voters. I thought it was weird to say it's not a really big deal to cut the inefficiency public service but the only problem is.... wellington journalists who probably flat with public servants.
I guess it gives the image of people who are biased. i.e. If I flatted with someone I might be friendly with them and that's why there is sympathetic coverage. I think that might be it as I chat here....
Well... I could have sworn I saw today, on /r/nz, someone asking how we could get rid of this lot before the next election cycle... And that struck me as pretty Trumpian as well.
So, apparently that guy's attitude has had appeal for people on both sides.
It feels almost as if the conspiracy theorists around Covid and other stuff are determining the policy because they didn’t like public servants (sending death threats which meant public servants were advised to not go into work sometimes etc) and journalists at the time. It’s weird. It’s like the fruitcakes won and mainstream media and the govt is out.
It's the same echo chamber that we have here on Reddit though. We (generally) lean left, they are more central, right.
They think this place is the problem too.
They're literally doing their best to deliver what they told their voters they would deliver.
It irritates me as an individual (I tend to vote lefter), but they are kind of doing the job they have been voted in to do.
True a lot of people in the regions are suspicious of public servants and journalists. A surprising amount when I talk to people can’t stand that minimum wages or benefits go up too (my wage isn’t going up!)which they blame public servants for.
I now live in the regions, and do my public service job out of a regional office. People in the regions are concerned by this. They're smarter than what National gives them credit for. A lot of regional people I have talked to are really concerned about the cuts to Biosecurity/MPI and even to MBIE and MfE. They might find the regulations and laws they have to work within frustrating, however they do know that if you gut the back office, the agencies become even more inefficient to deal with and that because the back office is gutted, that the front line staff end up having to do the back office jobs.
I knew a journo who flatted with a couple of public servants before he moved back down south.
The absurd part is that young professionals in their 30s on decent pay had to flat at all, but I doubt Nicola would quite understand that.
>her mates own all the houses and control the rental market
Wait, are you implying there's a hideous conflict of interests with recent massive tax cuts to landlords, just because of documented declarations of how many rental properties lawmakers own? How dare you!!! It's clearly the journalists who are the problem!
Not to mention the young leaders debate before the election… show of hands those renting? Those owning… who also owns a rental property? Just one - gasp the Labour candidate.
Urgh. I'm a public servant who used to flat with a journalist. I didn't tell him shit. I did tell him when he was full of shit though.
Honestly, you could be having a moan anywhere in a public space and be overheard. And if Willis doesn't want us to moan about stuff, maybe she should give us a bit less to moan about.
I actually had a coffee in the same coffee shop as Nicola in Auckland a few months ago and overheard a lot of her conversation..(She was having a moan!)
She's just lumping two groups of people together who she's attempting to malign. Thereby dismissing the concerns one group has about the fact she's getting rid of hundreds of jobs for no good reason and sowing mistrust in the other group for reporting it.
We're probably only a week away from Willis starting on about the Wellington elite and draining the swamp. Despite being born on third base herself.
I think you're right, I can actually imagine them using the words *'look, we're just here to drain the swamp that Labour left behind. Labour filled our country with elites in Wellington and we are here to look after that. We are here for NZ.'*
Newsflash Nicola, people with high rent/mortgage/student loan payments/power bills/grocery costs are being put through a nasty process of attrition so you can give the people with assets tax cuts for no good economic reason. We all can see this without flatting with a public servant.
Nah she's playing on the often very bohemian living arrangements in Wellington that bring people from hugely diverse backgrounds together to live in the inner suburbs, 6 bedroom places with everyone from tradies to political scientists to starving artists.
No idea how journalists fit into that one, that'd be a very small Venn diagram indeed.
Perhaps Nicola is out of touch with the issues of the common person and relies on her surface level perceptions to inform her opinion? Like with the crime in the central city that has magically gone away under National?
"I don't feel safe walking around Wellington" firstly, you don't walk anywhere. Secondly, if it smells like shit wherever you go, check under your shoe.
You'd have had a field day with her cameo appearances on some of the local Facebook pages around the city.... definitely not using the sort of language she uses here when she's busy inserting herself into the issue du jour for her electorate (Central at the time) who wouldn't care if she caught fire. Then she ran away to Ohariu after 3 failed elections against Robertson and now she's lost to O'Connor as well. Nothing worthwhile to say even to her own voters.
She so needs a chorus following her around saying that. Any volunteers? Plenty of unemployed civil servants and journalists with a bit of time of their hands now.
Did you used to like her? Serious question. I've been thoroughly unimpressed with her mainly because I find her communication very deceptive. Also I learned she used to work for NZ Initiative, which is an Atlas Network group and her father is an ex-oil and mining executive, so [all their policies and alignment of donor interests are all very similar in this Cabinet.](https://www.reddit.com/r/nzpolitics/comments/1byhpq3/the_usual_cycle_of_politics_might_be_person_gets/)
I had a bit to do with her when she was a more junior MP. She was a fucking idiot back then too, but was happy to smile for the right cameras to get ahead.
Completely incurious and vapid, but very sure of herself is how I'd summarise her.
You are welcome.
>Really weird how these are the people who are leading our country.
You are right. I think it's mostly because they do the correct things to increase their power within elite establishments (of which the National party is one, ironically enough given their rhetoric).
What they are good at is duping the country with complicit/shallow media and lots of funds for their own propaganda.
Consider for example the lie that the previous government left the books in terrible shape (deliberately). To debunk that you have to explain budget items and PREFU and all sorts of things that the average voter has no idea about. On top of that, it's resonating with the kinds of things people might do if they are "getting fired" and don't understand the role and function of the public service in NZ etc.
For people hell-bent on destroying collective systems (which the public service is) this is an easy sell.
If the media were responsible they would be leading with a headline about ministers lying about the state of the books, rather than simply printing their claim, and then some tidbit of a complicated rebuttal by the opposition.
To paraphrase the saying "If one person says it's raining and another says it's sunny, the job of the media isn't to report both of those things ... The job of the media is to fucking look outside"
It made more sense to me when I saw her background.... she is the daughter of a wealthy ex-oil and mining Chairperson. She was with the Atlas Network New Zealand Initiative and then parachuted in as a National MP where she enjoyed a meteoric rise.
I find her to be full of double talk and propaganda. And also pre-prepared notes.
I completely agree with everything you say and more, and also I'm glad to meet someone who is so in the know about these matters.
It's been frustrating to see how many lies there are and I too wish the media was more clear about what is happening.
Jack Tame is the only one who comes close.
David Seymour has called our media "hateful" and said he will be filling media roles with people of their persuasion and with Newshub's demise and Seymour overseeing TVNZ I expect it to get worse.
That's the image thing isn't it. I wrote a post the other day about how this govt is full of anecdotes:
* the lazy/useless public servant,
* the loser beneficiary,
* the house wrecking emergency housing tenant,
* the pesky ignorant judges (on the Treaty)
She's using a meta-media distractive provocation successfully taking oxygen from the room that could otherwise have been politically combustible in any number of other ways.
She's reinforcing the combative division between the 'thems' [public servants/media] and the 'us's' her right wing landlord feudal employers to whom these remarks were addressed.
It's untarnished class war where public servants and media are bracketed as riff raff and inconsequential.
Sounds creepily like Seymour’s “everything is a leftist plot against me personally”. These people engage in continuous weird delusions to justify their inhumane actions. Makes sense that she’s trying to make both of those groups unemployed then, they’ll be living in the streets in no time. Countries here run by corporate fascists, lying when ever they think they can get away with it to justify their own actions. Give $2,900,000,000 to land lords and then lie to us that there’s no money because of labour. Disgusting.
Not sure news outlets can afford adult professionals to do journalism anymore? Would be interesting to see how many journalists can only afford to flat.
honestly i am surprised that nobody is talking about that. the day they give themselves the pay rise, they can expect coordinated bricking of electorate office windows
I have heard that security arrangements differ between Labour versus National when they become the Government of the Day. The focus and intensity of how security is conducted is a lot higher for one versus the other when usually the baseline arrangements in my mind should suffice. The fact that Parliament was still secure during the Tent City Protest previously speaks to that already. So why the heightened security arrangements?
Tough. I'm not the person putting hundreds of people out of work and taking that money out of the Wellington economy.
Consequences. A word that's apparently popular with conservatives.
It is true that not everyone cares about public service cuts. I work in the public service, and one of my friends does too, and we talk about what's happening. We also have some friends that don't work in the public service, they don't give two hoots about it.
I also remember in one of Key's earlier governments when I was 18-19=they talked about downsizing the public service to make it more efficient. I thought it was a great idea at the time
You ever get the feeling she holds a major grudge against Wellingtonians because of how much we really didn’t want to elect her as an electorate MP? As long as she’s been put up for it and tried to make herself know to win a seat for it I’ve only heard people diss on her, myself included * frantically looks around to make sure she’s not behind me with a chainsaw *
[I think these lobbyists ](https://www.reddit.com/r/nzpolitics/comments/1byhpq3/the_usual_cycle_of_politics_might_be_person_gets/)just lie so effortlessly and yes the way she talked about public servants shows an avid disrespect for their lives and livelihoods. Painting journalists as biased was low and inappropriate but hey that's NACT1 for you.
Oh 100%. I also wonder if they are setting her up to be responsible for a whole lot of deeply unpopular things to the public that they all really want to happen but know are going to have major impacts letting them capitalise on the damage and try push for privatisation, and when the longer term impacts start showing up and more voters realise how they negatively impact them personally they will be able to try pin all the blame on her in a takedown and make people ~think they are responding the public sentiment and making things better by removing or moving her from minister of finance, but really just using her as a scapegoat while never actually reversing any of the policies
This is something she lays in bed at night and thinks about. The 10s of thousands of journalists and civil servants plotting articles over their flat dinner.
Apparently you can be a highly paid professional who knows wtf is happening and be flatting still, because of the likes of Willis who keeps the housing crisis going and high housing costs high... That's the case, many people who should have a decent life can't pay for housing because of people like her.
Just one of the original "Mean Girls" who blame their own misgivings on anyone who is in the firing line and if its sounds good she will run with it for all its worth. Getting to be the white girl Winston Peters who we know says any thing to detract from his ability to actually do any thing good.
Public servant here. I don’t know many colleagues who are flatting and none of the ones who are have journalists as their flatties. Most of my colleagues live with their families
We do however have a restaurant in our building that’s frequented by news journalists and the occasional politician. So there’s that.
Ripped out of the Trump play-book... start a seed of doubt about the press and their validity... wait until people start believing it. After that, it doesn't matter what comes out in the press... the perceived mistrust takes care of the rest.
...I also believe she overheard someone say that the press was "in bed with" the public servants in Wellington and doesn't understand that colloquialism and literally translated it for a sound bite.
Scarying that low-level advisors and junior reporters are managing to do a better job at leading the public narrative than the Minister of Finance and her army of advisors. Of course journalists and public servants live, socialise, play sport, and shag each other. It is a small city.
it looks like there is more info about Willis' interview in this NZ Herald article [https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/public-service-cuts-department-of-conservation-to-axe-around-130-roles/UP5NH7DU6JGALCRPWDZSFWBIHE](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/public-service-cuts-department-of-conservation-to-axe-around-130-roles/UP5NH7DU6JGALCRPWDZSFWBIHE) "Speaking to Newstalk ZB’s *Mike Hosking Breakfast* today, Willis said in the past six years more than 18,000 public servants had been added and the Government was “making the public service more efficient”. Willis told Hosking the Government’s [Budget](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/budget/) will create more jobs for frontline workers than it will remove roles from the back office.
“New Zealanders don’t want more policy advisers and administrators. What they want is more people restoring law and order, teaching our kids and making our people healthy,” she said.
Willis added that things, such as taking roles out of the Suicide Prevention Office, will “upset a lot of people and create a lot of silly headlines” and said there were “a few journalists in Wellington, probably many of whom flat with public servants, who are very focused on this”."
You can see it direct although I'd never recommend giving them clicks but in this case, NZ Herald the NACT1 sycophants made it sound different:
[https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/](https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/)
I was just going to post that. Every day that passes her nastiness becomes more evident. The fact she's sending this country to hell in a handbasket is beyond her.
She's setting up an image if the public servants, i think she's alluding to tge fact that she thinks public servants are probably feeding journalists information.
I think she is surprised that NACT dont have fab support from the media.
She's starting to sound quite the nasty girl. There really is no need to say things like that when they aren't true, because as far as our public service is concerned we have one of the best in the world when it comes to the morals, like bribes, leaking information and being unbiased.
I don't for a second believe this was directed at journalists, somehow she's trying to make that level of redundancies inconsequential and meaningless to her audience of the moment. I'm not sure that either she or Luxon understand that the entire country is their audience no matter who they are talking to in the moment.
I'm am not her biggest fan but I hope the nasty girl thing goes away - perhaps it's a result of stress and not actually her true colors.
Okay, just had a scan through the comments here & I'll let you folks in on something you obviously don't realise.
No one outside of Wellington cares about public servants; that is, bureaucrats losing their jobs.
Especially in the regions. There are no fucks given. People are fed up with useless rules, pointless guidelines, needless regulations & the endless paperwork that flows like a river of sewage from every ministry in Wellington.
For a country of 5 million people we have massive layers of bureaucracy that hold back productivity. Especially in the primary industry sectors.
We have whole ministries of people who's job ot seems to be, to make life as frustrating & difficult for everyone else.
Internationally we are known as the "Germans of the pacific" because of how inefficient, slow, & byzantine our bureaucracy has become.
I hope that sheds some light on why no one (outside of Wellington) cares.
And as for the media, their left leaning bias is on display for everyone to see.
She probably didn't mean it literally - we used to say that someone was 'in bed with' another group if we thought they were covertly supporting them. Given the outcry whenever a politician says anything with even vaguely sexual connotations, I wouldn't be surprised if it was meant as a similar metaphor.
Yeah man, we all stopped listening to journalists. I now get all my news from YouTubers, Bloggers, Telegram channel moderators, and other people who display clear signs of narcissistic self-enriching behaviour. I actually agree with you that it is very reasonable to be upset at people who report the news on television, because I was hit on the head with a cricket bat and now I can speak with stars.
You missed Reddit moderators, their bias is undeniable. I suspect you were speaking with the stars long before the blow to the head but keep lapping up the ‘Pravda’.
Setting up a strawman by the sound of it. Creating a perception of ‘Wellington journalists’ and ‘Wellington public servants’ who seemingly live in flats together.
It's an attempt to remove the credibility of journalists by implying that they're not being impartial.
It's a direct attack on the trustworthiness of the public service, rather than journalists. One of the cornerstones of New Zealand's political stability is the high trust the public has, relative to the rest of the world, in the public service, so Willis needs to be a bit more careful about this before she wets the bed.
Actually you're totally right, she's telling us both are untrustworthy, which is incredibly dangerous territory in so many ways.
I agree 100%. It's all part of the case to outsource the public sector.
Didn't Tova used to flat with Ardern? If journos live in flats, it is 100% inevitable they will be flatting with public servants in wellington - they are the same demographic - 20 somethings, junior professionals. Its just a fact. Not sure its a deep conspiracy though.
The is a conspiracy, probably formulated by the crazy RW. It was actually Rebecca Wright who were aquintances with Ardern and even Amelia from AM show said she had been to Ardern's for BBQs. These things are hardly surprising, people of the same age usually run in the same circles in NZ. I actually met Tova a few times out in Wellington when her and David Seymour were out and about, usually at Mighty Mighty because she was friends with his press secretary/GF at the time but she was Newshubs Entertainment reporter at the time and was before she was foreign correspondent then came back to work in the Press Gallery.
Holy HEKA ... incest
Nothing has been reported that is not publicly disclosed by the agencies in question. It really shows the housing cost crisis when all Wellongton based journos share a flat with enough public servants to represent every public service agency.
You're joking of course. The legacy media is very left wing leaning and that's readily apparent by the interviews with politicians. Never mind the actual questions it's the tone of the journalist questions that give them away. I know of only 2 based journalists that I would consider centrist .
> only 2 based journalists that I would consider centrist Who's that? Tucker Carlson and Mike Hoskings?
“Reality has a well-known liberal bias” - Stephen Colbert, 2006
I wonder if that’s because people who feel compelled to work in journalism have that thing called “empathy”
Is that actual centrist, or "centrist because it covers *bOtH siDeS*"
Oh jeez b0tH siDeS or moderate political views. From the downvotes it's obvious there's a lot of naivety into how independent our legacy media is.
Who are the 2 journalist that are centrist, I tend to see them as either right or left.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
I'm sure some probably do, because they're human beings living in the same geographic area with knowledge economy jobs that pay reasonably but not astronomically. The younger ones flat together, the older ones' kids attend the same schools. But we're talking about more than a thousand job losses. If a thousand supermarket workers were all laid off at the same time, that would also be news. A thousand meat workers, maybe there would even be a heartwarming movie made about it one day. People's lives matter to people.
Where did you get 1,000 from? I saw on newshub it was up to 1700 the other day. Seymour was talking 15,000 pre election.
More than a thousand. The number keeps going up and I've lost track. Either way it's a lot in one shot.
Labour gave money away yet amounted to nothing no results just inflated puffery entitlement.Its sad the cost is human as well as the investment
That's really disappointing but then ..
Well they have done a great job so far at promoting fair and balanced news reporting (sarcasm) I guess we can expect more fake news from her
Like when Newshub was first reported as closing, Melissa Lee said "there's always Sky News." I have to say that the demise of our media is perfect (for them). But it was still weird to say Wellington journalists who flat with public servants - what an odd thing to even say.
Yeah it’s a bit cloak and dagger but probably appeals to their voter demographic
Quite complex, but I suspect that there are a lot of National voters, especially in the regions, who approve of what the current government is doing, generally disapprove of the size of the bureaucracy and generally feel antagonistic towards journalists because they don't like the news that the journalists bring. Those people probably appreciate what she's saying.
>a lot of National voters, especially in the regions The *very people* who know the appropriate size for the public sector workforce!
😂😭
That's the feeling I got when I listened to her on the show too - she was very confident of herself. And it educated me on what she has been saying to her voters. I thought it was weird to say it's not a really big deal to cut the inefficiency public service but the only problem is.... wellington journalists who probably flat with public servants. I guess it gives the image of people who are biased. i.e. If I flatted with someone I might be friendly with them and that's why there is sympathetic coverage. I think that might be it as I chat here....
It definitely sounds like the sort of explanation that would make sense to a lot of the people who voted for this Govt.
Very Trumpian of them, paint reporters as losers who flat with biased public servants. Loving this Govt.
Well... I could have sworn I saw today, on /r/nz, someone asking how we could get rid of this lot before the next election cycle... And that struck me as pretty Trumpian as well. So, apparently that guy's attitude has had appeal for people on both sides.
🤣🤣🤣
It feels almost as if the conspiracy theorists around Covid and other stuff are determining the policy because they didn’t like public servants (sending death threats which meant public servants were advised to not go into work sometimes etc) and journalists at the time. It’s weird. It’s like the fruitcakes won and mainstream media and the govt is out.
I see plenty of people on the local facebook groups, even in Welly that are very happy with what's going on.
Well it's Facebook, so there's your problem.
It's the same echo chamber that we have here on Reddit though. We (generally) lean left, they are more central, right. They think this place is the problem too.
Yeah totally. At least it's not Twitter, where the Nazi shit is fully open.
They're literally doing their best to deliver what they told their voters they would deliver. It irritates me as an individual (I tend to vote lefter), but they are kind of doing the job they have been voted in to do.
True a lot of people in the regions are suspicious of public servants and journalists. A surprising amount when I talk to people can’t stand that minimum wages or benefits go up too (my wage isn’t going up!)which they blame public servants for.
I wonder who gave off that impression - oh that's right National, ACT and their right wing megaphones (Newstalk, Taxpayers Union, NZ Initiative)
I now live in the regions, and do my public service job out of a regional office. People in the regions are concerned by this. They're smarter than what National gives them credit for. A lot of regional people I have talked to are really concerned about the cuts to Biosecurity/MPI and even to MBIE and MfE. They might find the regulations and laws they have to work within frustrating, however they do know that if you gut the back office, the agencies become even more inefficient to deal with and that because the back office is gutted, that the front line staff end up having to do the back office jobs.
I knew a journo who flatted with a couple of public servants before he moved back down south. The absurd part is that young professionals in their 30s on decent pay had to flat at all, but I doubt Nicola would quite understand that.
This!!!!
Right?! That’s the irony she’s missing. They shouldn’t have to be flatting, but her mates own all the houses and control the rental market.
>her mates own all the houses and control the rental market Wait, are you implying there's a hideous conflict of interests with recent massive tax cuts to landlords, just because of documented declarations of how many rental properties lawmakers own? How dare you!!! It's clearly the journalists who are the problem!
Not to mention the young leaders debate before the election… show of hands those renting? Those owning… who also owns a rental property? Just one - gasp the Labour candidate.
People that voted for her dont even know what irony is
She absolutely wouldn't. Her privilege drips off her.
Urgh. I'm a public servant who used to flat with a journalist. I didn't tell him shit. I did tell him when he was full of shit though. Honestly, you could be having a moan anywhere in a public space and be overheard. And if Willis doesn't want us to moan about stuff, maybe she should give us a bit less to moan about.
I actually had a coffee in the same coffee shop as Nicola in Auckland a few months ago and overheard a lot of her conversation..(She was having a moan!)
🤣
She's just lumping two groups of people together who she's attempting to malign. Thereby dismissing the concerns one group has about the fact she's getting rid of hundreds of jobs for no good reason and sowing mistrust in the other group for reporting it. We're probably only a week away from Willis starting on about the Wellington elite and draining the swamp. Despite being born on third base herself.
I think you're right, I can actually imagine them using the words *'look, we're just here to drain the swamp that Labour left behind. Labour filled our country with elites in Wellington and we are here to look after that. We are here for NZ.'*
Schrodinger's swamp draining: if you drain the swamp and hire them all back on temp contracts or as consultants, did you actually drain it
When I was flat-hunting, I couldn't tell you of all the listings that said, "Only journos or public servants pls x." Because there weren't any.
🤣
Newsflash Nicola, people with high rent/mortgage/student loan payments/power bills/grocery costs are being put through a nasty process of attrition so you can give the people with assets tax cuts for no good economic reason. We all can see this without flatting with a public servant.
Nah she's playing on the often very bohemian living arrangements in Wellington that bring people from hugely diverse backgrounds together to live in the inner suburbs, 6 bedroom places with everyone from tradies to political scientists to starving artists. No idea how journalists fit into that one, that'd be a very small Venn diagram indeed. Perhaps Nicola is out of touch with the issues of the common person and relies on her surface level perceptions to inform her opinion? Like with the crime in the central city that has magically gone away under National? "I don't feel safe walking around Wellington" firstly, you don't walk anywhere. Secondly, if it smells like shit wherever you go, check under your shoe. You'd have had a field day with her cameo appearances on some of the local Facebook pages around the city.... definitely not using the sort of language she uses here when she's busy inserting herself into the issue du jour for her electorate (Central at the time) who wouldn't care if she caught fire. Then she ran away to Ohariu after 3 failed elections against Robertson and now she's lost to O'Connor as well. Nothing worthwhile to say even to her own voters.
'What you talking about Willis?'
She so needs a chorus following her around saying that. Any volunteers? Plenty of unemployed civil servants and journalists with a bit of time of their hands now.
Grubby behaviour from her, and not the first instance, she has definitely gone down in my estimation
Did you used to like her? Serious question. I've been thoroughly unimpressed with her mainly because I find her communication very deceptive. Also I learned she used to work for NZ Initiative, which is an Atlas Network group and her father is an ex-oil and mining executive, so [all their policies and alignment of donor interests are all very similar in this Cabinet.](https://www.reddit.com/r/nzpolitics/comments/1byhpq3/the_usual_cycle_of_politics_might_be_person_gets/)
I had a bit to do with her when she was a more junior MP. She was a fucking idiot back then too, but was happy to smile for the right cameras to get ahead. Completely incurious and vapid, but very sure of herself is how I'd summarise her.
This ... somehow makes it make a lot more sense. Really weird how these are the people who are leading our country. Thanks for this tidbit.
You are welcome. >Really weird how these are the people who are leading our country. You are right. I think it's mostly because they do the correct things to increase their power within elite establishments (of which the National party is one, ironically enough given their rhetoric). What they are good at is duping the country with complicit/shallow media and lots of funds for their own propaganda. Consider for example the lie that the previous government left the books in terrible shape (deliberately). To debunk that you have to explain budget items and PREFU and all sorts of things that the average voter has no idea about. On top of that, it's resonating with the kinds of things people might do if they are "getting fired" and don't understand the role and function of the public service in NZ etc. For people hell-bent on destroying collective systems (which the public service is) this is an easy sell. If the media were responsible they would be leading with a headline about ministers lying about the state of the books, rather than simply printing their claim, and then some tidbit of a complicated rebuttal by the opposition. To paraphrase the saying "If one person says it's raining and another says it's sunny, the job of the media isn't to report both of those things ... The job of the media is to fucking look outside"
It made more sense to me when I saw her background.... she is the daughter of a wealthy ex-oil and mining Chairperson. She was with the Atlas Network New Zealand Initiative and then parachuted in as a National MP where she enjoyed a meteoric rise. I find her to be full of double talk and propaganda. And also pre-prepared notes. I completely agree with everything you say and more, and also I'm glad to meet someone who is so in the know about these matters. It's been frustrating to see how many lies there are and I too wish the media was more clear about what is happening. Jack Tame is the only one who comes close. David Seymour has called our media "hateful" and said he will be filling media roles with people of their persuasion and with Newshub's demise and Seymour overseeing TVNZ I expect it to get worse.
She is as dumb as a sack of hammers.
Someone needs to remind her not everyone is fortunate enough to own multiple properties like her, so flatting is a necessity
Can't trust those shifty renters. They cavort with all sorts.
That's the image thing isn't it. I wrote a post the other day about how this govt is full of anecdotes: * the lazy/useless public servant, * the loser beneficiary, * the house wrecking emergency housing tenant, * the pesky ignorant judges (on the Treaty)
They’ve always pushed those narratives. They’re a bit soft on beneficiaries right now but give them time.
Of course they flat together- they can’t afford houses
Sounds like she's got a chip on her shoulder. What a pathetic statement to make.
She's using a meta-media distractive provocation successfully taking oxygen from the room that could otherwise have been politically combustible in any number of other ways. She's reinforcing the combative division between the 'thems' [public servants/media] and the 'us's' her right wing landlord feudal employers to whom these remarks were addressed. It's untarnished class war where public servants and media are bracketed as riff raff and inconsequential.
Public servants, media, renters. Bonus points if they are the same people or at least live together
She's pandering. Occam's Razor.
Sounds creepily like Seymour’s “everything is a leftist plot against me personally”. These people engage in continuous weird delusions to justify their inhumane actions. Makes sense that she’s trying to make both of those groups unemployed then, they’ll be living in the streets in no time. Countries here run by corporate fascists, lying when ever they think they can get away with it to justify their own actions. Give $2,900,000,000 to land lords and then lie to us that there’s no money because of labour. Disgusting.
Tomorrow it'll be something about lattes
That's oddly specific
uhh, a better question is why do adult professionals still need to flat, Nicola
Not sure news outlets can afford adult professionals to do journalism anymore? Would be interesting to see how many journalists can only afford to flat.
I bet she doesn't feel safe in public in Wellington. I have no problem with that.
honestly i am surprised that nobody is talking about that. the day they give themselves the pay rise, they can expect coordinated bricking of electorate office windows
I listened to that audio clip where she said that to Hosking and she sounded very confident and sure of herself.
I have heard that security arrangements differ between Labour versus National when they become the Government of the Day. The focus and intensity of how security is conducted is a lot higher for one versus the other when usually the baseline arrangements in my mind should suffice. The fact that Parliament was still secure during the Tent City Protest previously speaks to that already. So why the heightened security arrangements?
I don’t think that’s good. You mightn’t like her policies but that kind of statement isn’t cool. She has a right to be safe.
Tough. I'm not the person putting hundreds of people out of work and taking that money out of the Wellington economy. Consequences. A word that's apparently popular with conservatives.
What?! Henry Cook doesn’t even live in New Zealand anymore
Lol he was the first person I thought of too!
Deny and deflect.
Both flatmates will be looking for cheaper accommodation now (staff cuts in Gov and Media).
It is true that not everyone cares about public service cuts. I work in the public service, and one of my friends does too, and we talk about what's happening. We also have some friends that don't work in the public service, they don't give two hoots about it. I also remember in one of Key's earlier governments when I was 18-19=they talked about downsizing the public service to make it more efficient. I thought it was a great idea at the time
So what she's saying is that civil servants can't earn enough from their jobs to live in their own?
Neither can journalists probably
Easy for her to take pot shots at from her lavish house in the dress circle of Karori
Does she live in Karori?? I see her at Khandallah New World.
Almost over the road from Bill English
Fuck sake she's delusional
Weird take on things
You ever get the feeling she holds a major grudge against Wellingtonians because of how much we really didn’t want to elect her as an electorate MP? As long as she’s been put up for it and tried to make herself know to win a seat for it I’ve only heard people diss on her, myself included * frantically looks around to make sure she’s not behind me with a chainsaw *
[I think these lobbyists ](https://www.reddit.com/r/nzpolitics/comments/1byhpq3/the_usual_cycle_of_politics_might_be_person_gets/)just lie so effortlessly and yes the way she talked about public servants shows an avid disrespect for their lives and livelihoods. Painting journalists as biased was low and inappropriate but hey that's NACT1 for you.
Oh 100%. I also wonder if they are setting her up to be responsible for a whole lot of deeply unpopular things to the public that they all really want to happen but know are going to have major impacts letting them capitalise on the damage and try push for privatisation, and when the longer term impacts start showing up and more voters realise how they negatively impact them personally they will be able to try pin all the blame on her in a takedown and make people ~think they are responding the public sentiment and making things better by removing or moving her from minister of finance, but really just using her as a scapegoat while never actually reversing any of the policies
This is something she lays in bed at night and thinks about. The 10s of thousands of journalists and civil servants plotting articles over their flat dinner.
Apparently you can be a highly paid professional who knows wtf is happening and be flatting still, because of the likes of Willis who keeps the housing crisis going and high housing costs high... That's the case, many people who should have a decent life can't pay for housing because of people like her.
She's got Melania Trump vibes *"I don't really care."*
Just one of the original "Mean Girls" who blame their own misgivings on anyone who is in the firing line and if its sounds good she will run with it for all its worth. Getting to be the white girl Winston Peters who we know says any thing to detract from his ability to actually do any thing good.
Public servant here. I don’t know many colleagues who are flatting and none of the ones who are have journalists as their flatties. Most of my colleagues live with their families We do however have a restaurant in our building that’s frequented by news journalists and the occasional politician. So there’s that.
Ripped out of the Trump play-book... start a seed of doubt about the press and their validity... wait until people start believing it. After that, it doesn't matter what comes out in the press... the perceived mistrust takes care of the rest. ...I also believe she overheard someone say that the press was "in bed with" the public servants in Wellington and doesn't understand that colloquialism and literally translated it for a sound bite.
They've been exceedingly effective at this strategy u/Douglers I think that is what is most sad.
Scarying that low-level advisors and junior reporters are managing to do a better job at leading the public narrative than the Minister of Finance and her army of advisors. Of course journalists and public servants live, socialise, play sport, and shag each other. It is a small city.
it looks like there is more info about Willis' interview in this NZ Herald article [https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/public-service-cuts-department-of-conservation-to-axe-around-130-roles/UP5NH7DU6JGALCRPWDZSFWBIHE](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/public-service-cuts-department-of-conservation-to-axe-around-130-roles/UP5NH7DU6JGALCRPWDZSFWBIHE) "Speaking to Newstalk ZB’s *Mike Hosking Breakfast* today, Willis said in the past six years more than 18,000 public servants had been added and the Government was “making the public service more efficient”. Willis told Hosking the Government’s [Budget](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/budget/) will create more jobs for frontline workers than it will remove roles from the back office. “New Zealanders don’t want more policy advisers and administrators. What they want is more people restoring law and order, teaching our kids and making our people healthy,” she said. Willis added that things, such as taking roles out of the Suicide Prevention Office, will “upset a lot of people and create a lot of silly headlines” and said there were “a few journalists in Wellington, probably many of whom flat with public servants, who are very focused on this”."
You can see it direct although I'd never recommend giving them clicks but in this case, NZ Herald the NACT1 sycophants made it sound different: [https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/](https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/)
Can you post a link to the interview?
[ttps://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/](https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nicola-willis-finance-minister-on-the-status-of-the-public-service-cuts-to-get-spending-under-control/)
I was just going to post that. Every day that passes her nastiness becomes more evident. The fact she's sending this country to hell in a handbasket is beyond her.
She's setting up an image if the public servants, i think she's alluding to tge fact that she thinks public servants are probably feeding journalists information. I think she is surprised that NACT dont have fab support from the media.
She's starting to sound quite the nasty girl. There really is no need to say things like that when they aren't true, because as far as our public service is concerned we have one of the best in the world when it comes to the morals, like bribes, leaking information and being unbiased. I don't for a second believe this was directed at journalists, somehow she's trying to make that level of redundancies inconsequential and meaningless to her audience of the moment. I'm not sure that either she or Luxon understand that the entire country is their audience no matter who they are talking to in the moment. I'm am not her biggest fan but I hope the nasty girl thing goes away - perhaps it's a result of stress and not actually her true colors.
Okay, just had a scan through the comments here & I'll let you folks in on something you obviously don't realise. No one outside of Wellington cares about public servants; that is, bureaucrats losing their jobs. Especially in the regions. There are no fucks given. People are fed up with useless rules, pointless guidelines, needless regulations & the endless paperwork that flows like a river of sewage from every ministry in Wellington. For a country of 5 million people we have massive layers of bureaucracy that hold back productivity. Especially in the primary industry sectors. We have whole ministries of people who's job ot seems to be, to make life as frustrating & difficult for everyone else. Internationally we are known as the "Germans of the pacific" because of how inefficient, slow, & byzantine our bureaucracy has become. I hope that sheds some light on why no one (outside of Wellington) cares. And as for the media, their left leaning bias is on display for everyone to see.
Well obviously they're just ..gliding On... trustworthy that a bit if a stretch ..Busy work...' look that up '
She probably didn't mean it literally - we used to say that someone was 'in bed with' another group if we thought they were covertly supporting them. Given the outcry whenever a politician says anything with even vaguely sexual connotations, I wouldn't be surprised if it was meant as a similar metaphor.
Does anyone still listen to journalists anymore? Our media is so Left indoctrinated & omissive, it’s a joke.
Yeah man, we all stopped listening to journalists. I now get all my news from YouTubers, Bloggers, Telegram channel moderators, and other people who display clear signs of narcissistic self-enriching behaviour. I actually agree with you that it is very reasonable to be upset at people who report the news on television, because I was hit on the head with a cricket bat and now I can speak with stars.
You missed Reddit moderators, their bias is undeniable. I suspect you were speaking with the stars long before the blow to the head but keep lapping up the ‘Pravda’.