As another month of 2024 rolls out, another semi-famous foreigner lawyers up to commence defamation proceedings against Winston Peters, New Zealand’s deputy prime minister and foreign affairs minister.
Last month it was ’90s UK band Chumbawamba investigating legal remedies*; yesterday it was former Australian foreign affairs minister and premier Bob Carr. Because as the song says, when you get knocked down, you defame again. Or something to that effect.
Yesterday during an interview on Radio New Zealand’s morning report, Peters made a series of comments about Bob Carr, asserting he was “nothing more than a Chinese puppet”. Peters’ words followed comments Carr made recently while in New Zealand on a panel regarding the (remote) possibility of NZ joining AUKUS. Spoiler: Carr thinks that would be a dick move by New Zealand, especially because of our long-held nuclear-free stance.
Peters’ remark was heard by former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark, who promptly alerted Carr, possibly by telepathy, because within hours Radio New Zealand had removed the audio after a spokesperson from Carr’s office said the former premier considered it defamatory and would be commencing legal action.
For those of us who hadn’t been listening, there was the usual scurry of texts to colleagues to check exactly what Peters had said this time. We needn’t have worked our thumbs that hard, because during the afternoon’s parliamentary question time, Peters took the chance to not so much double down as dig a tunnel straight to Beijing.
With Labour’s David Parker throwing him the equivalent of a defamation Dorothy Dixer, Peters couldn’t resist using parliamentary privilege to repeat, reinforce and essentially add a jaunty Chinese Communist Party cap to his earlier statements. To make sure he made his point clear, Peters added he was “late to the party” in regards to Carr, referring to a 2018 opinion article by the Australian Financial Review titled “How Bob Carr became China’s pawn”.
But being surprised by Peters saying something outrageous is like being mad at the sun for rising and setting; it requires the kind of industrial-grade amnesia generally not available to voters who have been observing the 79-year-old for the past 500 years, or at least since he entered Parliament in 1978.
The person who should be watched closely over this matter is New Zealand prime minister Christopher Luxon.
Last week Luxon demoted two female ministers: Melissa Lee from the media portfolio, and Penny Simmonds from disability issues. During the press conference announcing the canning of both women, Luxon had a buck each way: he wanted to remain vague about the circumstances behind each woman’s professional demise, but also reap positive reviews for firm leadership. Spurting an evasive corporate-flavoured melange, Luxon wouldn’t explain why he was demoting the women other than to say their portfolios had suddenly become more “complex”.
During the press conference — having by now learned to keep repeating a sound bite because most of the time a poor journo will use it — he kept saying “This is how I roll, this is how I lead”. This was possibly an insensitive remark after two ministers had in fact been rolled, but in his favour was the general consensus that both ministers had been flailing if not drowning themselves in a series of woeful missteps.
Still, the optics of demoting two women simultaneously in 2024 has something of an unpleasant, possibly gendered air when you contrast it with how he handles men behaving badly in his cabinet.
Luxon also recently said he would be reprimanding two other very senior (male) coalition ministers for public statements that had been called “inappropriate and unconstitutional” by the Māori Law Society. There doesn’t seem to have been any consequences for either man.
And now with his deputy prime minister j’accusing all over the shop, will Luxon show us how he rolls?
Well, yes — late yesterday he was asked to comment on the matter and said: “They’re not comments I would make. I’m sure Bob Carr is a seasoned politician and understands the rough and tumble of politics.”
Carr’s office informed Crikey at 4.10 pm yesterday that his lawyers would be making contact with Peters’ office within the hour. Around the same time, several right-wing former politicians were appearing on radio. When asked if the coalition government will implode before its term is up, all agreed gleefully in the affirmative.
*Chumbawamba have spoken at length of their desire to stop Peters from using their song at political rallies, but, unlike Carr, have yet to engage lawyers.
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