Armstrong on Clueless Tolley

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, February 18th, 2010 - 19 comments
Categories: education - Tags: , ,

John Armstrong on our clueless Minister of Education, Anne Tolley:

“Ask the average person how the concept of “inter-school moderation” will work and you are likely to get a very blank look.

Ask the Minister of Education the same question and you would expect an informative reply, given the moderation of literacy standards is very much part and parcel of the jargon-filled argument over national standards in primary schools.

Anne Tolley may well know exactly how moderation will work. But her seeming reluctance to explain when questioned in Parliament yesterday left the distinct impression she was less than 100 per cent sure.”

It was a bit more than an impression, and it was a bit less than 100%. Tolley clearly had no clue.

“Tolley’s plight was plain to see in the expressionless faces of colleagues sitting around her.

She may as well have been in Timbuktu, such was the silence and seeming indifference of National MPs to the unfolding disaster.

[Lockwood Smith acknowledged] Mallard’s ‘quite clever questioning’.”

A bit more clever than the Minister of Education, that’s for sure.

” After Tolley sat down [having spoken in a later debate], Darren Hughes, Labour’s chief whip and wit, raised a point of order, asking why her speech had not been 15 minutes long – the time allotted to MPs giving their final speech before departing for good.”

One thing’s certain, if John Key had a better choice for minister, a better female choice to be precise, Tolley would be out on her ear. But Key can’t have just one woman on the front bench, so Tolley stays.

19 comments on “Armstrong on Clueless Tolley ”

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  1. mickysavage 1
    18 February 2010 at 12:50 pm

    There is no question for Tolley in Parliament today. Shame really I thought they would have been bursting to ask more.

    I watched it last night on TV and it was priceless.

    • Zorr 1.1
      18 February 2010 at 1:56 pm

      No need to harry an already mortally wounded victim. Just sit back and watch as they wander off to eventually die.

      We should have seen the last of Tolley 12 months ago. She is still here. All she is now is pieces of flesh without any concerted intelligence remaining to hold them together. Just have to wait and see.

  2. Moana Mackey 2
    18 February 2010 at 1:51 pm

    She isn’t here today so thats why no question to her!

    • felix 2.1
      18 February 2010 at 2:02 pm

      Probably catching up on a bit of reading.

      p.s. Question 8 looks interesting today…

      • Macro 2.1.1
        18 February 2010 at 2:07 pm

        Yes a book about a rat I gather. Very appreciative and subservient it was too!

      • mickysavage 2.1.2
        18 February 2010 at 3:01 pm

        Brownlee just mentioned the Standard in an attempt to avoid andwering the question. How typical. He should have mentioned No Right Turn as well.

        His memory is memory is remarkably vague.

  3. greenfly 3
    18 February 2010 at 2:27 pm

    A cornered rat will fight to the death…

  4. Shane 4
    18 February 2010 at 3:43 pm

    John Key relieved her of Tertiary Education so she could concentrate on national standards. She is obviously still overworked if she cannot answer Trevor’s question. Perhaps she needs to be relieved of more work.

    • Draco T Bastard 4.1
      19 February 2010 at 1:06 am

      I think you’ll find that she isn’t actually over worked – she just isn’t doing the work and is relying purely on her ideological beliefs.

  5. Anne 5
    18 February 2010 at 3:59 pm

    “There is no question for Tolley in Parliament today” says mickysavage. Not surprised. Last time she was caught out by Trevor Mallard she didn’t turn up the following day. I think Heather Roy answered on her behalf.

  7. tc 7
    18 February 2010 at 4:47 pm

    dissapointing that no further questions for Tolley or whoever else to drive home the point and kill off a crap minister…..does mallard think one day’s work’s enough….FFS when they’re on the ropes you go for the kill not allow them to regroup for a crosby textor cuddle……same for bennett……come on labor no mercy no quarter……play the game the way they play.

  8. PK 8
    18 February 2010 at 5:18 pm

    “but Key can’t have just one woman on the front bench, so Tolley stays.”

    Hehe, so they would be criticised if they had a male in the role regardless of his competence. Is diversity worth sacrificing basic competence? I couldn’t understand why someone like Peachey wasn’t given more of a role given his experience, but you’ve perhaps pinpointed one major reason.

    • lprent 8.1
      18 February 2010 at 5:32 pm

      I believe his personality and inexperience were also an issue. But what the hell, they couldn’t be any worse.

      • George D 8.1.1
        18 February 2010 at 8:30 pm

        I keep wondering about that. Peachey was their ‘superstar’ who was going to clean up education just a few years ago, and now he’s invisible.

        What’s keeping him hidden?

        • lprent 8.1.1.1
          19 February 2010 at 12:07 am

          Personality… From what I’ve heard, even his fellow MP’s find him to be a bit of a self-promoting dipshit. Besides his last school had a bit of financial crisis after he left. That kind of thing tends to dim a political star.

        • felix 8.1.1.2
          19 February 2010 at 12:41 am

          He has an awkward habit of letting his mouth fall open and screaming “S0CIAL1STS!! C0MM1ES!!” with all the timing and poise of a drunken tourettes sufferer.

          Not that his colleagues actually disagree with him, mind you, but it doesn’t quite mesh with the PR campaign.

  9. Depressed 9
    18 February 2010 at 8:15 pm

    Man is our news weak and crap. National are the laziest retards.
    National are a complete joke.

  10. SPC 10
    19 February 2010 at 12:57 am

    Shall I compare her to a summers day;
    there have been other summers,
    summers more fair, and of fairer days.
    Some summers days are a disappointment
    all too many this summer, this term.

    Can a thousand flowers of spring bloom,
    in the time of the all too moderate summer?
    Is the autumn of our discontent,
    the fruit of a misspent summer?

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