Heather du Plessis-Allan

Look, I think aside from the profile examples, which we've seen, you know, up north and other parts, there are committees that are legitimate.

There's emergency management committees, for example, that are established, which have specific expertise.

There are some set up under the treaty settlement redress legislation, which again, are under separate legislation.

So, you know, there are some examples.

Audit and Risk Committee is a good example where you might have an independent chair who has a specific finance and accounting background.

So there are

You know, there are some legitimate aspects and we've been conscious of that.

I have the powers to exempt the committee, but my law, well, the change that we're making basically is a blanket change.

You're not democratically elected, then you don't have voting rights.

And if you have a challenge with that or there's a very valid reason, then we'll have a look at it.

But first and foremost, we're keeping it very simple.

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Listen, I don't think anyone should be offended by Pete Hegseth saying that New Zealand is freeloading off the American military.

This is not a controversial thing at all to say.

The Australians have been privately complaining about us sponging off them for decades.

They've urged us to lift our spend to 2% of GDP for decades.

We have kept on spending at only 1% or thereabouts for decades.

Wayne Mapp, the former Defence Minister, probably said the quiet bit out loud.

In a noisy world, hear yourself think.