Labour happy to show Rob Campbell the door as he lashes out at crabwalk away from ‘co-governance’

ANALYSIS: New Health Minister Ayesha Verrall has acted decisively in getting rid of errant Health NZ chair Rob Campbell.

Campbell, who has had a long career in unions, business (he chaired Sky City, Summerset and Tourism Holdings) and latterly the public sector, was sacked by Verrall for taking to LinkedIn and lashing the National Party’s Three Waters scheme that it proposed on the weekend.

His post, among other things, said: “I can only think that this is a thin disguise for the dog whistle on ‘co-governance’. Christopher Luxon might be able to rescue his party from stupidity on climate change but rescuing this from a well he has dug himself might be harder.”

Verrall issued a terse statement on Tuesday afternoon saying, “I no longer have confidence that Mr Campbell is able to exercise the political neutrality necessary for his role at Te Whatu Ora.”. Senior public service or entity figures need to be able credibly work with all sides of politics, lest government changes.

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Last year there had been rumblings emanating from the Beehive about unhappiness with Campbell’s performance. How far those rumblings ever got towards removing him from his role at Te Whatu Ora – Health NZ is unclear.

Campbell did bring a refreshing openness to the job and about the challenges the health system faced. Compared with many who rise up through the health system and become creatures of it, he was clearly not “of” the system and had opinions about the troubles and how to sort it out. But not being part of the club – a feature over his career – and being outspoken can get you into trouble.

And fair enough that he had opinions of Three Waters. But his comments were made in a way and on an issue that seriously lacked judgement for someone chairing a Crown agency.

He defended his actions saying that the comments were made as a private citizen and that he was meant to be politically neutral not politically neutered. But Campbell has been round a long time and chaired a lot of things. He must have known, at some level, that that wouldn’t fly.

He may have been worried about the Government’s direction or his future and decided to go out as a martyr. Or, he simply suffered an affliction common to many baby boomers and non-digital natives that anything you say on the internet can be determined as private on your say so. It cannot.

Posting a message on a public message board is, well, public. Nowadays, it is barely different from going on the TV news and claiming that you are expressing a view as a private citizen.

For Labour this is a good thing. It cannot afford the impression that the wider apparatus of Government is stacked with anti-National Labour (or at least left-wing) mates. That Verrall moved to sack him quickly also pointed to a decisive streak in the new minister.

Campbell also chairs the Environmental Protection Authority. Environment Minister David Parker is currently not commenting on his future in that job, but it is hard to see how he can keep it.

“I’ve got no reason to think this impacts on my role with EPA,” Campbell said.

But consider the following statement on RNZ Checkpoint on Tuesday night:

“My view is that there is a desire on the part of the Government to back away from co-governance and working in partnership with Maori and that that was the piece that they were concerned about that iI raised in relation to the National Party’s statement.”

Campbell said that he was committed to Treaty partnership and that he would not apologise for that. Further he said that both Verrall and Chris Hipkins has misinterpreted the Public Service Commission’s code of conduct for entity boards.

After that, it is difficult to see how he will remain at the EPA under the current Government.

There have been harder heads within the Labour Party who have been concerned about co-governance for more than a year. Not that it happens, but in what context, how often and how much political prominence it is given.

From a strictly political perspective Labour has got rid of a public servant who looks partisan and who has now set themselves up as a martyr standing up for co-governance – arrangements which, Campbell is right, the Hipkins administration is crab-walking away from.

Labour can also now claim a new reset in health to boot. Not a bad outcome for the Government from an extremely imprudent LinkedIn post.