Guyon Espiner must have put away the poetry and studied up over the break as his interviewing has improved considerably. Yesterday he nailed Shane “Five Chins” Jones on Q + A.
GUYON Because we are often told aren’t we that there’s some sort of looming crisis here that we could reopen the wounds of division among Maori and Pakeha and have a New Zealand where Maori and Pakeha are turned against each other, I mean do you believe that?
SHANE Na, no no, I don’t believe that’s the case, although I must say Waitangi has a magnetic quality and it does draw all sorts of some strange characters to Waitangi, and there’s always the element of a random event, but look by and large people are there to celebrate the wakas, celebrate the Treaty and not to give biffo to each other.
That was the set now for the spike.
GUYON Because on November 26 last year your leader Phil Goff said exactly that, that we’re at the crossroads and that we faced a position where Maori and Pakeha could be turned against each other and we could face racial division. You don’t believe that by the sound of things?
Ouch, that would have wobbled the five chins, Espiner really crunched him there, he managed to get Shane Jone disagreeing with Phil “Seat Warmer” Goff. I suppose that isn’t hard to do considering Goff’s inability to maintain a single position on anything.
The set:
GUYON Just before we leave it, why do you think it is that Labour at the moment is so far behind National in the polls, what do you think is behind the public just not listening to Labour at the moment?
SHANE Well it was nigh on a year ago that we lost the election, and you know all of us as politicians were ambitious and no one likes to be kicked in the guts, the media I think are still enamoured with the Prime Minister and his ministers, and we just have to continue to chip paint.
Actually “Five Chins” it was more than a year ago. Now for the Spike.
GUYON You talk about ambitions, your own ambitions, does that extend to one day if you’re asked perhaps after an election defeat in 2011, would you take the leadership of the Labour Party?
SHANE Oh well that lies somewhere between our caucus and providence, so we’ll just wait and see about that.
GUYON But you’re not ruling it out?
SHANE Well we’ll just wait and see.
That most definitely not a no, unequivocally anything but a no. Shane “Five Chins” Jones is moving, it might not be now, it might not be this year but he is moving and he doesn’t have confidence in Phil “Seat Warmer” Goff.
