Tuesday, June 13, 2006
What's Trevor's beef?
Don't know what my electorate MP is up to today. During a snap debate over Auckland's power problem he repeatedly addressed the deputy speaker, Ross Robertson, as "Madame" speaker. When the speaker eventually asked him to use the word "Mister" Mallard refused and began using the terms "acting" and "deputy". His attitude to the chair was derisory and defiant. What's going on there? Any ideas?
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4 comments:
And they say when Clark goes to the UN or wherever he is a leadership contender. Sounds good for the Nats to me - the sooner the better - as he is a drongo.
pdm
It was the most peculiar and persistently defiant behaviour I have ever heard in parliament. He must have a personal problem with Ross Robertson - no respect at all. The guy's been in there for 19 years and is still only the deputy speaker - so maybe he is just a big zero in the eyes of his caucus?
I could hear the tension in Robertson's voice - he sounded shaken.
He hasn't been taking the leader-supplied testosterone suppressors?
Well, I've seen enough of Mallard under pressure to suspect he's just the kind of man who will go off over the most trivial things. (And I apologise for the libel on female dogs.) Didn't he flounce out of a series of public meetings during the whole school closure debacle last year, because the nasty proles were beckling and interjecting?
Then again, it's pretty hard to feel much sympathy for Robertson who would have been quite within his rights to terminate Mallard's speech and order him out of the chamber. Ann Hartley got herself in the same situation in the last Parliament - she behaved like a doormat (and one with a pretty poor grasp of standing orders) and got treated accordingly.
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