New type of leadership needed
Jacinda Ardern’s inspirational leadership a year ago is not the kind of leadership that is required now. When the country was in a state of shock and mortification at the senseless killings in two Christchurch mosques, she drew on her emotional intelligence to express the grief and solidarity that was needed.
Now we need raw intelligence and good instincts from her as the country faces the coronavirus crisis.
Her duties as Brown Owl this week, reinforcing the proper way to wash hands, sneeze and cough, is all well and good.
But she needs a good nose for where things can go wrong in the multiple layers of official advice being tendered about the Government response to the crisis on the health and economic front.
She needs to know when to ask the tough questions of officials whose tendency is to tell ministers what they want to hear.
She needs a finely tuned ear to detect flannel over fact and close advisers who can do likewise on her behalf.
Ardern’s closest advisers on the matter include Julia Haydon-Carr, a senior adviser in her office who is a public health specialist, and Brook Barrington, the head of Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and a former Foreign Affairs chief executive who is considered highly capable.
To give Ardern her due, at recent press conferences including two yesterday, she sounded incredibly well briefed on every aspect of the health response and border issues to this unprecedented crisis.
But the fact is that Ardern and wingman Finance Minister Grant Robertson have not been tested in this crisis — nothing like it.
There has yet to be any strain placed on the testing regime, on the plans that District Health Boards should have developed to support general practitioners, nor on hospitals, staff and equipment.
Some of the social media posts coming out of the infection zones in Italy with a first-world health system have been harrowing in their graphic details about the shortages of equipment to treat the disease.
The cancellation of this weekend’s Pasifika festival to avoid possible spread across third-world countries in the Pacific was a sound one by Mayor Phil Goff, despite the absence of a recommendation to do so from health officials. Contact tracing of an infected person — which has been comprehensive so far in New Zealand’s response — would have been virtually impossible for a big event in which more than 50,000 people would have been moving around Western Springs.
The Government has established plenty of special committees for the crisis apart from the special Cabinet committee including John Ombler, a former Deputy State Services Commissioner, with experience in the former Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, who is controller of the whole-of-government approach and reports to Barrington.
The Ministry of Health is relying on a technical advisory group of medical experts for advice on who should be tested, and whether that should be widened and Ardern says the Government can act very quickly if their advice changes.
There are suspicions, whether well founded or not, that New Zealand is not recording any community transmission because the criteria of who should be tested has been too narrowly focused.
That belief has been debunked by a Kantar survey showing that the greatest concern of respondents was the risk of economic recession.
New Zealand’s response so far appears to be going relatively well, especially in comparison to the chaotic response of the United States.
But it is important that Ardern continues to emphasise the measure of success in terms of slowing transmission rather than there having been no community transmission.
Otherwise when community transmission is established — as it inevitably will be — it will be seen as a sign of failure.
Failure would be an inability of the health system to meet the demand for testing or to have a shortage of equipment to adequately treat it, or not enough equipment to treat noncoronavirus conditions for which people continue to present.
And failure would definitely be any downgrade in New Zealand’s relationship and co-operation with Australia at such a critical time.
There must be concerns that two ministerial visits were cancelled this week; one by the Australian Defence Minister to New Zealand, and one of Grant Robertson to Canberra.
Robertson’s office insists that it was not the Australians who cancelled on New Zealand and that it was Robertson’s decision so he could fit in other meetings related to his economic rescue package next Tuesday.
But continued co-operation with Australia is imperative especially as it is conceivable that the virtually free border could be in jeopardy.
In all likelihood, the Tom Hanks experience suggests that when the virus is established here, it will have come from Australia given the degree of contact between the two countries.
Robertson has already been in regular contact in recent weeks with his counterpart, Josh Frydenberg, who on Thursday outlined a A$17.6 billion ($18b) response to the crisis.
But the New Zealand response has been relatively slow compared to Australia.
That may reflect a belief by some in Government that New Zealanders have had greater concerns about the health risks associated with coronavirus than its impact on jobs.
That belief has been debunked by a Kantar survey showing that the greatest concern of respondents was the risk of economic recession and of people losing their jobs, well ahead of concerns about actually getting sick (margin of error 3.6 per cent).
The package can’t come soon enough for the likes of Tourism Industry Aotearoa chief Chris Roberts who estimates that his sector is set to take at least a $7b hit on revenues this year from its usual $18b contribution.
It will be a busy weekend for Ardern. She has the March 15 memorial service tomorrow where how she communicates will be everything.
She has also indicated that she and the special Covid-19 Cabinet committee will be on the case over the weekend reviewing border restrictions and preparing the finance package. It is in those decisions that her intelligence and good instincts will be critical.