Labour MP Phil Twyford is calling for Nic Blakeley to resign. Photo \/ Mark Mitchell<\/p>\n
In a statement today, Labour immigration spokesman Phil Twyford declared Blakeley\u2019s position was untenable. <\/p>\n
\u201cNic Blakeley must be accountable for his actions,\u201d Labour MP Phil Twyford said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat cannot simply be treated as business as usual. Parliament must be able to hold the Executive and public service to account, and that requires truthful and accurate information.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is about maintaining public confidence in our democratic institutions. When a senior public servant misleads Parliament, there must be accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement last week, Blakeley said he accepted the findings and took responsibility.<\/p>\n
\u201cAccountability rests with me. Parliament, Ministers and the public are entitled to expect better from MBIE.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy focus now is making sure a failure of this nature does not happen again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roche last week said the findings were \u201cextremely serious\u201d and \u201ccompletely unacceptable\u201d, a point he had made clear to all public service chief executives.<\/p>\n
However, he refused Blakeley\u2019s resignation offer as he didn\u2019t believe it would be \u201cfair or proportionate\u201d, noting the committee didn\u2019t call for further sanction.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr Blakeley was only six weeks into the chief executive role when this occurred. That does not excuse what happened, but they are factors I considered in reaching my decision about his position.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr Blakeley is responsible for ensuring the failures identified by the Committee are addressed. I will hold him accountable for delivering that work \u2013 there is no misunderstanding on that point,\u201d Roche said.<\/p>\n
Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche refused Blakeley’s resignation. Photo \/ Mark Mitchell <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said deliberately misleading MPs was unacceptable, but believed the outcome was \u201cfair\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019d been in the role six [weeks] and he\u2019d [not been] advised correctly by his officials so I think they\u2019ve got to a good outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the Public Service Commission launched its review, Stanford refrained from expressing confidence in Blakeley, saying she would wait until the review concluded.<\/p>\n
However, she changed her tune last week while acknowledging the review was ongoing.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs it stands, I have confidence in Nick Blakeley.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not downplaying the report, it was very, very serious, but at this stage, I have confidence in him to turn this around to make sure it never happens again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adam Pearse is the Deputy Political Editor and part of the NZ Herald\u2019s Press Gallery team based at Parliament in Wellington. He has worked for NZME since 2018, reporting for the Northern Advocate in Whang\u0101rei and the Herald in Auckland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Labour MP Phil Twyford is calling for Nic Blakeley to resign. Photo \/ Mark Mitchell In a statement…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":586626,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,286023,138,3500,3937,803,36192,84587,1122,3938,12513,2082,1874,917,374,6721,83832,28874,12936,76566,17318,111,43,139,69,1523,3263,3056,312,9644,236146],"class_list":["post-586625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-after","tag-blakeley","tag-business","tag-ceo","tag-chief","tag-continue","tag-deliberately","tag-demands","tag-employment","tag-executive","tag-failed","tag-for","tag-found","tag-immigration","tag-innovation","tag-labour","tag-mbie","tag-ministry","tag-misleading","tag-misled","tag-mps","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-over","tag-project","tag-resign","tag-says","tag-scandal","tag-untenable"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586625"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586625\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586626"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}