The Hive had been wondering why the Ministry of the Environment delayed the relaese of its major report on the state of the environment from December when it was ready, until the day after the PM's major speech in which sustainablity was the key issue. The NZ Herald Editorial suggests that there indeed might be a link:
A certain righteousness pervades the Labour Party that leads it to believe its policies and political interest are indivisible from the public interest. That assumption underlay the election-card spending controversy after the last election and was evident in the explanation for the political hirings and firings at the Environment Ministry in recent years.
The ministry, it was said, had become politically important because "sustainability" was to be a central theme of Labour's next election campaign. The implications of that explanation have been overshadowed by ministers' problems.
Since when did a department became an instrument of an election campaign? The very suggestion has damaged the Environment Ministry's credibility. Last week, it issued a disturbing report on the country's environmental state, a stocktake on everything from air quality to marine life. Is the place as polluted as the ministry claims or is this setting the scene for Labour's campaign?
