Ardern stands up for kiwis

Today politics seems to be dominated by Australian ridiculousness, after the Australian government blamed Chris Hipkins (rather than hard-working Australian journalists) for exposing Barnaby Joyce as a New Zealand citizen, and Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop interfering in our election by saying that she would find it hard to work with an NZ Labour government (or, to put it another way, the racist, homophobic Australian government prefers National and Bill English. Good to know; now we can all vote accordingly). The good news is that with Joyce exposed as ineligible to sit in Parliament, Bishop may not be Foreign Minister for much longer. But we've also learned something useful: that when push comes to shove, Jacinda Ardern stands up for kiwis against our "allies":

It is highly regrettable that the Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has chosen to make false claims about the New Zealand Labour Party.

[...]

I also note that Internal Affairs Minister Peter Dunne has confirmed that the Australian media inquiries were the instigator of this issue and that he has described connections of the New Zealand Labour Party to this issue as “utter nonsense.”

I greatly value New Zealand’s relationship with the Australian Government. I will not let false claims stand in the way of that relationship.

I would happily take a call from Julie Bishop to clarify matters.

I have also contacted the Australian High Commission to register my disappointment and will be meeting with the High Commissioner later today.

Hopefully she'll mention our disapproval of Australia's refugee concentration camps while she's at it.

In a time when Australia is mistreating New Zealand citizens and the US seems to be trying to start as many wars as possible, it would be useful to have a Prime Minister who would decide foreign policy based on New Zealand's values, rather than just falling in meekly behind the powerful. That's what Helen Clark did over Iraq, and its clear that Jacinda Ardern is the same. The contrast with Bill English couldn't be any clearer.