Pansy Wong bids for worst minister award

Written By: - Date published: 11:22 am, February 19th, 2010 - 11 comments
Categories: sexism, wages - Tags: , , , , , , , ,

When you’ve got a Finance Minister who can’t get basic statistics right, a Social Welfare Minister who can’t define her flagship policy, a Minister of Education who doesn’t understand her flagship policy, and a Minister of Justice who is running scared from his government’s major justice policy, it’s easy for an incompetent Minister of Women’s Affairs to slip through the cracks. Let’s take a look at Pansy Wong’s pathetic performance yesterday:

Catherine Delahunty reveals that despite Wong’s pledge to get more women on government boards there are virtually none on the big ones the government has created to advise it on the big issues

  • National Infrastructure Advisory Board – no women
  • Tax Working Group – 13 men, no women
  • 2025 Taskforce – five men, one woman
  • National standards advisory group – four men, one woman

(listen to the idiots on the National backbench shriek like banshees, it’s their covering tactic for a weak minister)


Then Wong says something really interesting, she claims the pay gap is closing up National after widening under Labour (she has made this claim before). Wong refuses to table her official source when asked. Let’s check it out ourselves. Quarterly Employment Survey results for ordinary pay, male and female:

So, gap decreases all the way under Labour, then starts getting wider under National. See wages have stopped rising too. Nice work National.

Later in answering questions from Sue Moroney, Wong refuses to just give a simple answer on her report to the UN (presumably she doesn’t know what they are). Wong is then in denial about growing female unemployment and refuses to reinstate the pay equality workforce. Moroney reveals that Wong, desperate to claim some achievement, told the UN that paid paternal leave was extended to 14 weeks under National, when it was actually extended under Labour and National voted against it:

A truly awful performance from a terrible minister. In a decent government, she would be a perpetual embarrassment. In this one, she is protected by the herd of worse ministers in more senior roles.

While we’re on the subject of bad ministers, here are Anne Tolley and Paula Bennett from Wednesday:

11 comments on “Pansy Wong bids for worst minister award ”

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  1. Bill 1
    19 February 2010 at 11:56 am

    Using rational argument in the face of cultism won’t usually result in much more than disbelief at the level of the cultists stupidity or anger at their apparent inhumanity.

    And this government is basically exhibiting the symptoms of a cult insofar as so many of its ministers seem unable to grasp what it is that they themselves are saying. Know what I mean?

    Talk to any cult follower, whether political or religious and you get basically the same shit and wind up in the same frustrating dilemma as you do when trying to engage with the members of this government.

    But what to do when the corporate sponsors and their media want the programme of the cult to succeed? That would be the $64 000 question I guess.

  2. exbrethren 2
    19 February 2010 at 12:01 pm

    The disgusting Coleman tops the list for me.

  3. pollywog 3
    19 February 2010 at 12:08 pm

    Oh well at least the minister for PI affairs is polynesian (albeit Maori) and a woman. Glad to see the time for that being an excuse to be silent when the menfolk are talking is well past…hmmm

    Still, it’s one thing to talk a good game and another to play it.

    http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/leadership+skills+vital+youthful+population

    We have a saying in hiphop. The game is to be sold not told, though i prefer the ‘put up or STFU’ maxim.

  4. toad 4
    19 February 2010 at 12:51 pm

    Tolley still wins.

  5. tc 5
    19 February 2010 at 1:24 pm

    What a poll….not unlike ranking players in the worst team ever….shades of craptacularity……for me Chief Clown Johnny who doesn’t even try followed by Basher, Tolley, Smith…..Brownlee/Power aren’t flash but at least they run a decent facade whereas Basher/Tolley just fail.

  6. Jim Nald 6
    19 February 2010 at 1:42 pm

    Sounds like the current Govt ministers are keenly competitive when it comes to earning the prize of being the worst minister!

  7. PK 7
    19 February 2010 at 4:29 pm

    “Catherine Delahunty reveals that despite Wong’s pledge to get more women on government boards there are virtually none on the big ones the government has created to advise it on the big issues”

    But isn’t this focus on gender/ethnicity itself the problem here? These terrible ministers you mention are largely there due to their gender. A great example of why choosing people for identity reasons is an awful idea.

  8. Rex Widerstrom 8
    19 February 2010 at 4:57 pm

    (listen to the idiots on the National backbench shriek like banshees, it’s their covering tactic for a weak minister)

    I got two words for ya, Marty: Jill Pettis. Oh, and two more: Lianne Dalziel.

    Lockwood’s doing a good job of keeping the shrieking to a minimum, but if I had my way I’d impose a “no noise other than from the person on their feet or instant ejection” rule, and then start (slowly) relaxing it from there.

    And now I sound like Peter Dunne. *goes looking for a noose*

  9. Helen Kelly 9
    20 February 2010 at 5:41 pm

    Catherine missed one – ACC Stocktake – all men

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