Steven Joyce passes the buck | The Jackal

5 Mar 2013

Steven Joyce passes the buck

Today, the NZ Herald reported:

Novopay Minister Steven Joyce says there is "a wider range of villains" behind the troubled payroll system than the National MPs whose offices are being picketed by frustrated teachers today.

Members of the New Zealand Educational Institute, representing primary and intermediate teachers, have been protesting outside 35 National MPs' electorate offices this morning.

Understandable considering people are now leaving their jobs because they weren't getting paid.

Mr Joyce told TVNZ's Breakfast programme this morning that he understood the teachers' frustration.

But he said there were plenty more people to picket than just National MPs - including former Labour education minister Trevor Mallard and his then adviser Chris Hipkins.

"I understand they want the thing solved, but actually there's a wider range of villains in this ... This problem goes back many years and in fact this is the second pay system which has been difficult."

The problem here is most definitely a result of National ministers incompetence. It might have been Labour MPs who initially set up the deal with Talent2, but it was Education Minister Hekia Parata, Finance Minister Bill English and the Associate Education Minister Craig Foss who signed off on Novopay going live despite obvious flaws in the system.

National trying to blame Labour for its failures is nothing new, but when it's such an obvious manipulation of the truth, such dishonesty should receive widespread condemnation... Pity our mainstream media is so toothless.

Mr Joyce said there had been similar issues with the pay system for teachers introduced in the 1990s.

In my opinion, Joyce's excuse is entirely pathetic!

"And that's an important thing to point out, too. There's always errors in a pay system and in fact this time last year, the old system was delivering about five or six hundred teachers that weren't being paid."

Even if true, that's certainly no justification for the continued failures inherent within the Novopay system.

It appears that Joyce is more focused on blaming others for a problem National created instead of getting on with the job of fixing it, which doesn't look like happening anytime soon. That makes me wonder if they actually want to fix Novopay at all?