Chris Hipkins will need to make some decisions about Kiri Allan

ANALYSIS: On Thursday night embattled Justice Minister Kiri Allan posted a message on her Instagram. The message was pretty promptly deleted.

In it, she said she had had challenging times with mental health of late, before hitting back at what she called “unsubstantiated allegation”, which were reported in media last, week about her alleged treatment of staff and senior officials.

(Several high level public officials have voiced their concerns about her conduct to Stuff. One, for example, said she ‘’yelled and screamed at staff”.)

Allan said that she knows that the allegations “will stick”.

The tone then took a darker and more personal turn, revealing someone in emotional pain when she claimed that her former partner of three years had “found new love less than a few weeks after we parted”.

She also appeared to cast doubt over her future as a minister, at least for the time being.

“And me – Well, with all these allegations thrown about, it looks like I’ve got no future in the one thing I do above all else – mahi.”

And while still hitting back at the stories in media, she did issue a more general apologia of sorts.

“For anyone I’ve caused pain or hardship too, bloody heck I’m sorry. I am the most imperfect person I know. I’m sorry. To anyone, anywhere, that felt like I didn’t uphold them, cherish them, or treated them poorly. That’s not something I would have wanted for you, or myself. Mo taku he, Arohamai.

Allan is clearly not in a good way. While there can be a public expectation for politicians to be robots, they are, of course, human. And a relationship break-up coupled with a high workload in a job with 360-degree scrutiny can only be extremely difficult. Relationship break-ups can be harrowing in the best of times, in jobs with no public profile.

And posting these sorts of matters in seeming desperation on social media is clearly not the best way to try to resolve them.

Allan is currently away from Parliament – it is the first week of a parliamentary recess and school holidays – and it is understood that Prime Minister Chris Hipkins is of the view that she can and should take whatever time to get herself right.

There is, however, a political question about what to do about her job in the meantime.

Her position on Hipkins’ front bench seemed assured – he promoted her further after all. It would be fair to say that she has, at times, struggled and shown errors in judgment since taking on more senior ministerial roles. The most glaring being an ill-judged and inappropriate speech at an RNZ farewell for her then partner.

And there is also little doubt that some of the work coming across her desk from the public service would have been substandard. Anyone who has seen work or advice obtained under the Official Information Act would quickly realise that the advice is highly variable in quality. Whether she dealt with that reasonably is the point is question.

And just because she hasn’t had a great run in the past year doesn’t mean that she won’t be a good minister with time. She is a good communicator, can be very warm and has an open and no-BS sort of style. It’s a tough job a balancing accountability to voters, the PM, the party, media, public service, sector groups and everyone else in between.

She is also on the upward arc of her career. In common with now former minister Michael Wood – who, unlike Allan, lost his jobs and will have to be thoroughly rehabilitated if he is to come back as a minister at a later date – she is seen as part of Labour’s future and on the ascent. This differed from Stuart Nash, who also lost his ministerial gigs, and who was most probably at the back end of his political career anyway.

Most people would also be unable to name many Government ministers and Allan is also most probably one of Labour’s more well-known faces and personalities among the public.

When I wrote a profile piece on her in early 2021, I said she was “irreverent, fun, and determined” and that, “while friendly and with an earthy and somewhat infectious laugh – her staff were joking before our interview that you can hear the minister before you can see her – there is clearly a harder edge and a sense of mission that drives Allan”.

These are great qualities in a politician, but in the two and a half years since, the edge seems to have become harder; the infectious laugh, less frequent.

All that leaves Hipkins – and Allan herself – needing to make decisions around what the best thing to do until the election. Hipkins, a pretty unflappable character, who went through a marriage separation and was himself subject to the Molesworth rumour mill during the intense Covid-19 period, will have significant sympathy for Allan’s situation.

He has consistently said he will not act on what he currently considers rumours and speculation in relation to Allan’s alleged treatment of staff and senior officials.

But what happens next will unlikely be anything to do with that, but what is best for Allan in the coming months.

To bring her back into full ministerial work until the election – which in her post she herself worried she might have no future in – and bring her back into the glare of the spotlight. Or, essentially give her a break, Parliament rises at the end of August anyway and Allan could be given a less stressful run into the election.

Politics is a tough game and there’s a fair bit of both politics – and pastoral care – that will need to be balanced by Hipkins here.