National’s Tony Ryall has made a disgrace of himself, yet again. This time, by labelling a Government initiative to hasten improvements in the detection of colon cancer (which kills 1200 people a year) ‘a political stunt’. Here is Health Minister David Cunliffe and Ryall on National Radio:
CUNLIFFE: I’m not doing this because of votes, I’m doing this because I’ve seen evidence which indicates we can do good, we can save lives. I am not happy that the previously proposed timetable [for routine colonoscopys] is aggressive enough and I think Mr Ryall would join with me and say that if we can do this more quickly with a view to that can it be achieved that we should do that. Look, I know there’s an election later in the year but I’m, frankly, far too busy with the portfolio to think about election stunts and I just hope that Mr Ryall could see this glass is half full rather than half empty again.
RYALL: I think that the Government is desperate and is going to come up with anything that makes it look as though they’re dealing with the issues.
Here’s a Minister dealing with a serious issue, even reaching out to National because surely this should be a common cause. Yet all Ryall can do is play politics in the most pathetic, hollow manner.
Ryall would rather the issue was not addressed and people die of colon cancer than for voters to hear a good news story about the Government.
You’ll note that not once in the interview does he suggest what National would have done differently. Why? Because National isn’t going to spend more on health, it’s going to spend less.
National doesn’t have a solution to colon cancer or any other issue. All it has is rabid attack dogs like Ryall and hollow calls for tax cuts.
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