Chris Hipkins spent a huge amount of political capital when he gave Stuart Nash a fourth chance in his Cabinet. Now the Prime Minister faces big questions as to how much confidential Cabinet information has been leaked and the influence it’s had. Political editor Jo Moir explains.
It has barely been two months since Chris Hipkins became Prime Minister, and he’s already into his third Cabinet reshuffle.
When Hipkins announced at a last-minute press conference at Parliament on Tuesday evening that he had dismissed Stuart Nash as a minister, there was no shock or surprise.
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Ten days ago, when Hipkins made the decision not to dump the Napier MP from his Cabinet - despite three blatant breaches of the Cabinet manual - he set in train an inevitable slow and painful wait to be let down once more by Nash.
The most surprising part was that it took so long, and the most damaging aspect is that the latest revelations are so much more egregious and reflect not only on Nash, but cast a shadow over Hipkins and his Cabinet colleagues.
Nash’s latest stuff-up in a long list of poor judgments was sending an email in June 2020 to two contacts regarding a commercial rent relief package that Cabinet had considered. In the email, brought to light by Stuff, the minister set out his opposition to the Cabinet decision and laid out the positions his colleagues had taken.
The recipients of the email were Troy Bowker and Greg Loveridge, both donors to Nash’s campaign and commercial property owners with an interest in the Cabinet decision.
The problem for Hipkins is that sacking Nash doesn’t close the door on those perceptions, and it is unclear how many other instances of this sort of behaviour there have been in the five years he’s been a minister.
This came after Nash had already been put on a final warning after it was revealed he had contacted the Police Commissioner to try and influence a court case, been reprimanded by the Attorney-General for making inappropriate comments about another court case, and used his MP capacity to contact a senior public servant to fast-track an immigration case.
Speaking to media about his decision to dismiss Nash, Hipkins said the MP's latest actions “raise perceptions of influence which cannot stand”.
The problem for the Prime Minister is that the sacking doesn’t erase those perceptions of influence, and it is unclear how many other instances of similar behaviour there may have been in the five years Nash had been a minister.
It’s highly likely some sort of wider investigation will need to be conducted to ensure there haven’t been any other situations where confidential Cabinet information has been leaked and used for personal gain.
There’s also a big question mark over whether the Labour caucus can still trust Nash - though when Newsroom asked Revenue Minister David Parker whether all trust had gone out the window, he denied that saying, “I think there’s a sadness that Stuart’s made that mistake and suffering the consequences”.
Parker believed Nash could stay on as an MP and regain the trust of his caucus, although he dodged questions about whether it was better for his errant colleague to hold on for the sake of avoiding an expensive byelection in his seat.
Nash made no public appearance on Tuesday night, with Hipkins saying he had gone home and had people supporting him. But RNZ reports he texted a reporter that there would be no byelection in Napier.
National Party leader Christopher Luxon is happy for the taxpayer to pick up the roughly $1.2 million it costs for a by-election. However, if Nash remains an MP until April 15, such a contest can be avoided as it would fall within the six-month window before the general election.
Luxon said Nash’s behaviour meant he needed to be gone immediately, and National would contest any byelection – something ACT leader David Seymour said was a complete waste of money at a time when people were struggling in a cost of living crisis.
Given avoiding a by-election within six months of a general election requires support from 75 percent of Parliament, a contest in Napier may be inevitable if National insists on going to the polling booth.
Hipkins hasn’t ruled out the Labour Party making decisions in coming days about Nash’s fate. There could yet be moves to say he’s not welcome to come back to caucus, but given Nash is almost certainly going to decide he won’t contest the Napier seat at the election, that should be enough to keep the party happy and avoid any formal suspension and a by-election.
The Prime Minister said Nash had well and truly crossed the line that would have allowed him to remain a minister, but wouldn’t be drawn on whether he’d tolerate having him in the caucus, saying he hadn’t had time to consider that properly but telling Newsroom he expected the MP would be doing some deep reflecting on his next steps.
Nash tried to resign as a minister when Hipkins presented the allegations put to him by Stuff, but the Prime Minister wasn’t letting him off that easily, saying the seriousness of the misconduct meant a dismissal was warranted.
While Hipkins might hope that makes him look stronger in the final moments of Nash’s ministerial career, in reality he missed his chance to be swift and decisive 10 days ago.
