The Public Calls Simon Bridges To The Stand: For Simon Bridges and Paula Bennett the Jami-Lee Saga is far from over. A great many questions have accumulated over the course of Labour Weekend and it is clear that neither the Leader nor his deputy can answer them without the risk of re-igniting the political firestorm of the past ten days.
THE RIGHT’S RESPONSE to Jami-Lee Ross’s temporary detention
at Middlemore Hospital has been interesting. The National Party’s defenders
flatly reject the idea that its leadership has acted in any way improperly in
relation to Ross. And yet, piecing together what little information has made
its way into the public domain, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that at
the point of crisis, early on Sunday morning (21/10/18) Ross was in the company
of a National Party MP. Whether it was this MP, or someone else, who became so
alarmed by Ross’ behaviour that they called the Police, remains unclear. What
is certain is that Ross was conveyed to Middlemore because he represented a
danger to himself, or others, and against his will.
That, barely 48 hours later, Middlemore was willing to
release Ross strongly suggests that the circumstances which gave rise to his
temporary detention no longer existed. Friends have provided a place of refuge
for him out of Auckland where he is currently recuperating, taking stock, and
considering his future.
For Simon Bridges and Paula Bennett, however, the Jami-Lee
Saga is far from over. A great many questions have accumulated over the course
of Labour Weekend and it is clear that neither the Leader nor his deputy can
answer them without the risk of re-igniting the political firestorm of the past
ten days.
If, for example, the blogger Cameron Slater’s claim that
three of the four anonymous complainants who featured in the Newsroom
exposé of Ross’ behaviour towards women are employed in either the Leader’s or
the Deputy-Leader’s office is confirmed, then the public may feel that they
have been short-changed when it comes to being given all the relevant details
surrounding the charges levelled against the Botany MP. The public may also
begin asking why these details are available from a blogger, but not from the
journalists of the Parliamentary Press Gallery?
Questions are also being asked about whether or not, over
the course of the past month, the National leader and/or his deputy were in
contact with Ross’ medical adviser/s? And, if so, whether those advisers had
warned Bridges and/or Bennett that it would be unwise to do or say anything
likely to jeopardise Ross’ already compromised mental state? If the public were
to discover that the National Party leadership had been explicitly cautioned
against naming Ross as the probable leaker of Bridges’ travel expenses – but
went ahead and did it anyway – then they might form the opinion that Ross’
manic night-time ride from Auckland to Wellington, and his epic media stand-up
the following morning, were entirely avoidable events.
Such speculation cannot possibly be helpful to Bridges and
Bennett – raising as it does the thought that Ross may have been used as the
unwitting instrument for rallying the National Party caucus behind a leader
whom the voters showed little sign of warming to or respecting. The idea of
making a mentally unwell MP the means of achieving such a disreputable
objective is not likely to inspire very much in the way of trust or confidence
in the putative perpetrators. Quite the reverse, in fact.
The problem with this sort of speculation is that much of
the known conduct of the National Party leadership appears to reinforce it. If
someone was intending to push a mentally fragile person over the edge, then
threatening him with the anonymous testimony of four aggrieved female
complainants, might recommend itself as a highly effective way of doing so. If
that someone then publicly suggested that the person in question had been
behaving in ways incompatible with his status as a married man, well then, it’s
easy to see how the notion that he was being pushed to the limit might take a
firmer grip on the public mind.
To the truly cynical, the sudden appearance, in the very
midst of Ross’ jihad against his former National colleagues, of a
sensational exposé detailing the Botany MP’s abusive and manipulative
relationships with three parliamentary staffers and an unnamed National MP
would elicit only the most sardonic of grins. If one was writing the script for
such a political melodrama, the line given to Bridges would have to be: “Whew!
That was lucky!”
Just how lucky was revealed by TVNZ’s political editor,
Jessica Mutch Mackay, on Tuesday evening (23/10/18) when she described how
National’s numbers, in the Colmar-Brunton poll being conducted coincident with
Jami-Lee’s jihad, were plummeting right up until the moment, mid-week,
when the story detailing Ross’ improprieties began to dominate the headlines.
The word “fortuitous” hardly seems to cover it!
Questions, questions, questions: there is still so much that
we don’t know about the extraordinary events of the past ten days. And perhaps
the most frustrating aspect of the whole saga is how unwilling all but a
handful of journalists have been to dig too deeply for the facts the public is
so anxious to learn.
Fortunately, for the historical record, there is one person
who knows a great deal about all of the events touched on in this post. Resting
quietly, in an undisclosed but secure location, the MP for Botany, Jami-Lee
Ross, waits patiently for all of these many questions to be put to him. How should we expect a man who has nothing left to lose to answer – except with the
truth?
This essay was
originally posted on The Daily Blog
of Thursday, 25 October 2018.
