Beyond the headlines

While there is no question that Lianne Dalziel had to resign, it is worth noting that while I have had little direct contact with her, I have found her likeable with a good sense of humour. Many of my friends in Young Labour rate her very highly as a great mentor and supporter. I can empathise how sad it is to have a 14 year political career destroyed through a lack of judgement. Politics is a very unforgiving career for those who go into it.

Also a lot of empathy for the staff of her office who like many parliamentary staff lose their jobs when their MP or Minister loses his or her job. Most employees have some idea when their contract will finish or if a company is considering redundancy. To start the week with no worries about job safety, and finish it effectively unemployed is very harsh.

One of Lianne’s staffers I met almost a decade ago when I worked for the ad agency which worked for Porirua City Council, and she worked for Porirua News. We had a photo op at the local refuse dump to do with some development announcement and during the photo shoot a passing seagull decided to crap on one or both of us (our memories differ as to who actually got shat on!). So I’ve always associated Juli with seagulls to this day 🙂