Government Blames Labour For Andrea Vance’s Article

The National-led government, flailing like a fish out of water, is now pointing fingers at Labour for Andrea Vance’s critical column in The Post. Finance Minister Nicola Willis, in a display that can only be described as unhinged, has tried to pin the blame for Vance’s blistering critique on the opposition, as if Labour somehow coerced a veteran journalist into calling her Pay Equity debacle out.

Everybody knows that it’s not Labour’s job to police the mainstream media when, on the odd occasion, they dare to hold the government to account. Vance’s piece, which deployed the C-word to describe Willis and her coalition harpies, was a critique of a government that’s betrayed women with its pay equity changes.

Many New Zealanders would agree with Vance, although most probably wouldn’t have used her language. And National’s response? A pathetic attempt to dodge accountability by crying “it’s all Labours fault!”


On Saturday, The Post reported:

The girl-math budget that will cut deep, especially for women

Turns out you can have it all. So long as you’re prepared to be a c… to the women who birth your kids, school your offspring and wipe the arse of your elderly parents while you stand on their shoulders to earn your six-figure, taxpayer-funded pay packet.

Let’s talk about the real issue: National’s desperate spin to deflect from their unfair pay equity changes. Rushed through under urgency with no select committee scrutiny, the government gutted 33 active pay equity claims, making it harder for women to seek justice for systemic underpayment. Willis and her coalition cronies (ACT’s Brooke van Velden in particular) have the gall to claim this isn’t a pay cut, when it clearly is.

By raising the threshold for claims from 60% to 70% female-dominated sectors and narrowing comparator jobs, they’ve ensured fewer women will succeed in future claims, effectively pinching billions of dollars from their pockets. David Seymour himself admitted it’s about “saving billions,” yet Willis denies it’s about budget cuts. Who do they think they’re fooling?

Even after the Speaker of the House, Gerry Brownlee, had already warned Brook van Velden, she chose to continue raising the issue of Andrea Vance’s article. van Velden then use the C word in Parliament (without being thrown out), rounding her accusations of sexism onto former Labour Minister, Jan Tinetti, like it is her fault that Andrea Vance wrote the article. It's clearly not the oppositions fault that the government is copping flack from all corners for gutting the pay equity claims process.

Today, 1 News reported:

Minister drops C-bomb in Parliament while quoting controversial column

Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden has become the first MP to use the word c*** in the House of Representatives when she repeated it after former minister for women Jan Tinetti asked about a controversial opinion column in relation to the Government's changes to the pay equity process.

You can understand why government Ministers are losing their cool at the moment. The backlash to their Equity Pay Amendment Bill has been brutal, and not just from the usual left wing commentators. National’s own right-wing allies are turning on them. From Shane Te Pou to Janet Wilson, many conservatives have felt compelled to comment, warning that National’s betrayal of women voters will haunt them, especially with women under 50 already abandoning the party in droves, per Roy Morgan polls. These aren’t lefty activists; they’re National’s own base, clearly stating that this policy should’ve gone to a select committee for proper scrutiny, not rammed through like a midnight mugging.

Brooke van Velden foaming at the mouth about Vances' article, and Nicola Willis whining about “sexist slurs” and Labour’s “weaponising” of the issue, shows that these ministers are out of her depth, clutching at straws to avoid responsibility. The truth is, National’s pay equity debacle is a self-inflicted wound, a cynical move to balance the books on the backs of underpaid women. No amount of calling Labour liars is going to change that fact.

Vance’s column didn’t need Labour’s prompting; it practically wrote itself by channeling the sentiment of a nation fed up with a government that prioritises tax cuts for the wealthy over fairness for workers. National’s attempt to spin the fallout as somehow Labour’s doing is as laughable as it is desperate. The real scandal? A government so arrogant it thinks it can lie its way out of betraying half the population.