Democracy Project NZ, Summarised by Centrist
Allan’s conduct in the last few months raised serious questions about the politician’s integrity, but she was kept in one of the top political roles despite the warning signs. Hipkins would have calculated that the impact of suspending, demoting or sacking Allan would be yet another black mark against his government.
That raises questions about whether Hipkins made a serious mistake in not dealing with her situation earlier.
It is hard to ignore that there have been five Cabinet reshuffles during his very short time as PM.
A narrative will now be embedded in many voters’ minds that a core problem of competency and judgement is lacking in the Beehive this year.
Voters will judge him poorly on this if they feel that the decisions he made were more about electoral calculation than doing the right thing.
