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Chapter 1: Is the Nicola Willis public service announcement to be admired or condemned?
Is the Willis Public Service announcement to be admired or condemned? I think the former, on balance. They should have done it properly, of course, two years ago, and they didn't. Hence, they probably should not be back here now, unless this was their Machiavellian plan all along, two public service haircuts a term.
But assuming that wasn't it, we go back to a lost opportunity that should be, could be in the rear-vision mirror by now. What they talked, if you remember, what they talked was a big game. What they delivered was a surgical whimper.
Yes, it's always sad to lose jobs and restructure and cut, but few outside the Wellington bubble would argue with the fact that the growth engine of public service work was absurd and 65,000 is a city, not a workforce. To make it worse... They got the same headlines and noise and pushback, if you remember, over a couple of thousand cuts as they would have 10 times over.
So we're back for another crack driven by necessity. This is the bit to be admired. I mean, laying lots. Think about it. Laying lots of people off an election year is not really a vote getter. Mind you, I think it's fairly safe to say most of the public service are probably not conservative, so the vote loss may well be minimal.
It's a horrible thing working in an environment where your future is part of the political wind. I faced it at TVNZ and Radio New Zealand. Whoever woke up on what side of the bed had some effect on what you were paid and whether you were hanging around long. It's no way to have a job.
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Chapter 2: What are the implications of cutting public service jobs in an election year?
And in that sense... You can blame the Labour government. I mean, stacking the place with well-paid work, and yet, as you applied, if you thought about it, surely you would have thought, this can't last. And it hasn't. This, as the unions bleat, is not about the public service and its value. I mean, they do a lot of good things, a lot of vital things.
There are a lot of very capable, if not talented people in the mix. But it's the extra, the excess, the fat that needs to be trimmed. This is fiscally desperate to a degree and operating allowance now of 2.1 billion and savings from anywhere and everywhere. I mean, you can't accuse the government of priming the pumps. The pumps don't work because the vandal stole the handles.
If you know you did one. The point slashing spending and killing jobs is not your traditional electioneering, is it? That's to be admired. For more from the Mike Hosking Breakfast, listen live to News Talk ZB from 6 a.m. weekdays or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.