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Matthew Hague: Lawyer on the Government's response to the Covid Inquiry · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So the government's responded to the COVID inquiry, accepting all
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: sixty three recommendations in some forum or another, and it's
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: promising to release the advice behind any major decision affecting
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Kiwi's rights, and they've promised to do that within five days.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: It's also vowed to make emergency support faster, more targeted,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: and also they want to make of course, they want
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: to rebuild the public trust. Here's some men.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: The right response is to review existing laws and make
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: sure that for purpose whilst balancing our economic needs, our
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: health response and individual's rights and freedoms.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: All right, so we're joined now by Matthew Haig, who
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: is a COVID lawyer. Good morning to you, Matthew, Good
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: morning at you. You're happy with this response? Is it's enough?
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: I'm happy with the words that they are using. And
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry this is going to sound cynical, but we
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: had a pandemic response when COVID hit. The problem is
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: the main problems with the previous government's response is they
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: deviated from it.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: So what is the biggest lesson We've learned from that.
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: That governments will do what's politically expedient at the time
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: and Again, I don't want to be cynical. The seven
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: action points that the government is saying they will change.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: This is positive stuff. Strengthening the rule of law, protecting
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: fundamental rights. These are good things.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Well, will it start future governments deviating from the course?
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Is it strong enough to do that?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: No, these are the words future governments. We live in
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  Speaker 2: a system with political supremacy. They will do what they
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  Speaker 2: want to do. The only thing I think that will
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  Speaker 2: the biggest handbreak on future governments is the public backlash
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: when the previous government's resport went too far. I hope
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: that future governments will see that and realize that that
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: kind of thing comes at a political cost.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: The other big thing is, of course, is the advice
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: within five days on stuff, particularly when you're in a
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: national emergency like a pandemic. Would that ease a lot
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: of concern for people?
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: I think again it's a positive step. Transparency is a
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: good thing. What I suspect we will see is if they,
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: as if advisers, know their advice we've made public very quickly,
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: it will quite quickly become quite land high level advice,
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: uncontroversial because they know it's going to be publicly released.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay, Now, there's no doubt that some New Zealanders
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: suffered more heavily than other New Zealanders through the pandemic.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: And when sim Peter says we need to have more
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: inquiries to review what happened to them, do you agree
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: with that?
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  Speaker 2: I do. And what I'd really want to see is
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: an inquiry focused on the public health response, not just
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: a political response. We had part of that in the
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: World Commission. But I think a lot of people have
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: a sense of frustration and this COVID response. Talk about
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: rebuilding trust, that's a good thing. We need to rebuild trust,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: or what about trust in the scientific community, because I
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: think that's really lacking at the moment.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: And where did the scientific community lose public trust? How
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: did they do that?
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  Speaker 2: I think that they took a purely scientific response. You know,
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: everyone should be vaccinated, vaccine mandates for everyone, without considering
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: all of the non health factors that go with it,
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: the impact of fundamental rights, people's ability to choose it
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: was the one source of truth. It was an inability
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: to recognize that there could be more than one scientific
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: viewpoint without being a conspiracy theorist or anything like that.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Well, exactly, and there was debate about the vaccines, and
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: I saw a lot of evidence about that. What I
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: never saw any evidence about was whether a mandate would
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: actually work.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: Yes, and look, I think it did it. I think
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: we had an incredibly high vaccination rate. We were always
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: going to have it. The mandate might have increased that slightly.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: But as we know very clearly now, and the evidence
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: at the time probably indicated this a there was risk
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: that we weren't being told about. And the vaccine wasn't
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: a perfect solution. It did have it short forced.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: Yes, well, the search for a perfect solution. I spent
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: my whole life looking for a perfect solution. When I
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: understand that, Matthew. But the good thing about this thing
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: is that it's saying, well, we didn't get it right,
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: but let's try and get it do it better. It's
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: about learnings. It's about learnings people, because this will happen again.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: Thank you for your time, Matthew.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: to News Talk Set B from five am weekdays, or
• 4:13
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