They've used urgency to cancel Question Time.
Question Time is the primary day-to-day means of holding the government to account. While urgency normally overrides this, the recent practice (since at lest the mid 90's) has been to hold it anyway by leave. The government has chosen not to do this. As a result, they will not have to face a question time until March 16.
For a government facing regular daily grilling over its decision to raise GST, its destruction of democracy in Auckland and its plans to destroy it in Canterbury, its health cuts, not to mention the sheer incompetence of its floundering Education Minister, that probably looks like a good idea. But democracy is all about holding governments to account, and that is supposed to make them uncomfortable. The public of New Zealand are being robbed here of our right to see our government tested - and we should not accept it.
