Trust, coalitions, and long memories: In Parliament, broken trust has consequences, Anna Whyte says

Some people start with a dose of scepticism and build up trust over time. Others trust until that trust is broken.

For journalists, it is drilled into you to keep your sources safe and confidential at all costs. For a lot of them, a slip-up could cost them their job or more. They are risking their livelihoods to inform the public of an issue that needs light, by putting trust in us. 

Trust is important.

And a pertinent example of that is the Immigration NZ saga.

Investigations have been launched this month over Immigration NZ’s failed Biometric Capability Update (BCU) project. Launched in 2018 without Cabinet approval, it misled ministers and has needed $31 million from this year’s Budget to end it.

Since then, the question of whether officials misled a select committee in March - by failing to disclose the programme had been axed - has been referred to Parliament’s Privileges Committee, RNZ reported. In essence a serious move reflecting the gravity of the situation.

How can you trust your officials? Immigration Minister Erica Stanford was asked.

“It is very difficult to trust officials when they are deliberately withholding information from you and providing misleading information,” she said.

Ministers need to be able to trust their officials - they’re doing the grunt work of the Government’s policy plans, they are supposed to be the alarm bell when things go wrong, or have their finger on the pulse over any potential issues in the portfolio.

But while there are some people in life you can place blind trust in, maybe a parent, a best friend or a partner - officials are not included.

Stanford said while those involved in the incident did not represent everyone at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (which Immigration NZ is a part of), she still needed to be reassured that behaviour and integrity issue would end.

While it may never regain to the level it once was, the Immigration NZ will no doubt be working at an extreme pace to regain that trust.

Trust is important in all walks of life, and Parliament is no exception

As a junior reporter many years ago I was tasked with asking politicians if they trusted Winston Peters. Only one politician I asked pushed back and I recall described it along the lines of inappropriate.

That was the last time I asked that particular question, but inappropriate or not, that question never went away.

National Party campaign chairman Simeon Brown spoke of trust five times during his address at the party’s conference on Sunday.

Questioning the country’s trust in Chris Hipkins. Questioning the country’s trust in Labour. And lastly, questioning the country’s trust in his own coalition partner.

“In 2005 a party vote for New Zealand First was a party vote for Helen Clark, Trevor Mallard, and Phil Goff. In 2017 a party vote for New Zealand First was a party vote for Jacinda Ardern, Chris Hipkins, and James Shaw. Do you want to take that risk again? No, and I don't either."

“You just can't trust them,” he told the crowd.

That comment led the question from the past to pop up again.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon was asked shortly after at a press conference, “do you trust [Winston Peters]?”

“I've trusted him in Government. Absolutely,” Luxon said. 

Trust is one of the most important currencies in Parliament and knowing where you can spend it is both vital and rare. Once it's gone, there is no recount, no renegotiation, and no way back.

And the difference is that in Parliament, trust doesn't stay private. It ends up in the Privileges Committee, a campaign speech, or a carefully measured 'absolutely'.