Armstrong on Peters
John Armstrong defends Peters against calls to sack him:
Those demanding Peters’ resignation say his opposition to the NZ-China Free Trade Agreement makes his position untenable. The charge simply does not stack up. …
Nothing has changed in the interim. Suggestions that Peters has suddenly placed the Government in a constitutional quandary are laughable and his critics know it. However, they are using his opposition to the China FTA as a convenient tool to mask their real agenda – ridding Parliament of him and NZ First.
Heh my agenda with Peters has never been very hidden – getting rid of him will be a wonderful day – a day in which I will not remain sober for more than 15 minutes.
Peters had to come out against the deal. Not doing so would have run counter to his party’s fundamental planks. It would have meant he went into the election with one arm tied behind his back.
His party could have voted against, and he could have abstained though.
But rather than credit Peters with a measured response, his critics instead exploited public ignorance of NZ First’s confidence and supply arrangement with Labour to falsely portray him as redundant as Foreign Minister.
I disagree that the response was measured, just because Peters is not attacking Labour in Parliament over it. That would just ensure he was sacked, so I don’t give credit for him doing just enough to undermine it, but not quite enough to get sacked.
It may be anomalous for the Foreign Minister not to support what, for Labour, is a major triumph in trade policy. But that anomaly has existed ever since Labour agreed to give him the foreign affairs portfolio. The anomaly is apparently now an absurdity. If so, Labour – not Peters – should be taking the rap.
Oh I agree. And what should be remembered if they did not have to agree to make him Foreign Minister. He had agreed to give confidence and supply without it, but they wanted a closer relationship where they could tie him in closer to the Government.
As foreign minister, he has hardly put a foot wrong. If he does nothing else, his success in speeding the normalising of relations with Washington and the rapport he has with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has more than justified his tenure of the foreign affairs portfolio.
But that, too, has been forgotten in the rush to condemn him.
I will admit his desire to improve the US relationship has been laudable, and he has done well there – especially the relationship with Rice.