(or Luxon’s language lessons)
It’s no secret that our great leader, Christopher Luxon, isn’t the most articulate of people.
(Hmm, should that be leader or leader adjacent? He comes across as more puppet than leader, and I’m sure most of us has some strong thoughts on who is pulling the strings. We’re looking at you, junior coalition partners).
But I digress. Back to our not-so-articulate Prime Minister. He was interviewed this week by the usually sympathetic Mike Hosking, who simply wanted a straight yes or no answer to one straight-forward question: If Andrew Bayly hadn’t quit his ministerial role, would Luxon have sacked him. I’m not generally a fan of Hosking, but he did a fine job of highlighting just what it is that is so FECKING FRUSTRATING about Luxon’s method of answering questions.
And what I’ll say to you is this: he trundles out his regular cliches and never actually fucking answers. Sigh.
As the lovely Paddy Gower pointed out, the interview went like this:
- Hosking: Question
- Luxon: Waffle
- Hosking: Question
- Luxon: Waffle
This cycle went on for three minutes. Three painfully long minutes. And at no point did we get a yes, or a no.
Hosking did, however, get royally pissed off by the waffle and deflection and eventually snapped at Luxon, saying: “This is why you’re in trouble in the polls. People want something decisive. And look, if you wouldn’t have sacked him, say so. Either way, I don’t care.”
I’m not a huge fan of Hosking, but it was a lovely moment and if I could have reached through the screen, I’d have given Hosking a hug. Or at the very least, a high 5.
Former National Party chief press secretary Janet Wilson said Luxon seems to struggle when it comes to communicating clearly, that he appears to memorise talking points: “He rote learns it to a point where he is nothing but a talking robot and has no flexibility in his thought processes,” she said.