A full apology
Allan Peachey did stuff up with his e-mail to a principal in his electorate. However good to see that he has now done the right thing and made a personal explanation in Parliament where he said:
“I wish to apologise for the e-mail, for the sending of the e-mail. I apologise to all who found it objectionable and in particular I apologise to the recipient of the e-mail. I accept full and sole responsibility for what happened. It was, by my own standards, not good enough.”
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Tags: National
December 7th, 2005 at 7:34 am
What the hell sort of behavior is this?
Taking responsibility? Acknowledging error? Saying SORRY????
This is not what Labour hasa taught us at all!
What is parliment coming to?
December 7th, 2005 at 7:35 am
Fair enough, but there is a shadow over his judgment which means he will have to prove himself fit for high office. There was so much hype about this guy. Nevermind they cannot all be stars and opposition is the time to sort people out, not all of the new crop will work out.
December 7th, 2005 at 8:40 am
He has “done the right thing” ? !
He made a nasty bullying threat and is trying to save his bacon now. The only “right thing” he has done here is reveal his true colours, and they’re not pretty.
I wonder how the bullying culture was in his school? People were probably too scared to talk of it.
December 7th, 2005 at 9:12 am
Sending threats to a school in his own electorate? You cannot threaten to kill someone then apologise! It’s illegal let alone coming from an MP!! It was very very very stupid. It will be a long time before Peachey lives this down.
December 7th, 2005 at 9:14 am
Mikey Bill:
First, I really think you’re the last person to be lecturing anyone on sending “nasty bullying threats” over the ether.
And I’m sorry to sound like DBP here, but I have to wonder why the one place Carol White apparently hasn’t send this e-mail over the last month is the Police? That’s what I’d have done if I’d really thought a snarky postscript to an e-mail constituted a credible threat of physical violence.
I’d also like Maharey, PPTA Debbie Te Whaiti and Selwyn BOT chair John Hinchcliff (who also happen to be a Labour Auckland City councillor) to explain exactly what “retribution” any Minister (let alone an opposition associate education spokesman) could exact against White or Selwyn College?
Does the Education Minister now have unrestrained abilities to fire and deregister teachers, remove Boards, divert funding and close down schools in a pursuit of some personal jihad?
As I’ve said elsewhere, I’d also suggest Mr. Maharey (or his predecessor Trevor Mallard) shouldn’t hump his high horse too hard, given his own history of *ahem* free and frank exchanges with individuals in the education sector over the years.
Peachy himself has some experience of how Trevor Mallard takes criticism of Government policy very personally indeed. And I wonder if there’s any truth in the rumour I’ve heard on the local grapevine that the call went out in union circles last year that any dirt on Rangitoto College in general, or Peachy in particular, would find a willing ear in *ahem* the right quarters…
But I guess that’s not the kind of political “bullying culture” mikeybill objects to.
December 7th, 2005 at 9:16 am
Mikeybill – sit in the corner and knit. After reading the report my first reaction was simple, obviously bad blood between these two, and the comment re knife in the back was a sarcastic retort. My god I thought people like you were fictitious.
December 7th, 2005 at 9:18 am
Mikey Bill:
First, I really think you’re the last person to be lecturing anyone on sending “nasty bullying threats” over the ether.
And I’m sorry to sound like DBP here, but I have to wonder why the one place Carol White apparently hasn’t send this e-mail over the last month is the Police? That’s what I’d have done if I’d really thought a snarky postscript to an e-mail constituted a credible threat of physical violence. (Hell, we’ve have to build a new prison just for some of the more wing-nutty commentators in the Kiwi blogisphere.)
I’d also like Maharey, PPTA Debbie Te Whaiti and Selwyn BOT chair John Hinchcliff (who also happen to be a Labour Auckland City councillor) to explain exactly what “retribution” any Minister (let alone an opposition associate education spokesman) could exact against White or Selwyn College?
Does the Education Minister now have unrestrained abilities to fire and deregister teachers, remove Boards, divert funding and close down schools in a pursuit of some personal jihad?
As I’ve said elsewhere, I’d also suggest Mr. Maharey (or his predecessor Trevor Mallard) shouldn’t hump his high horse too hard, given his own history of *ahem* free and frank exchanges with individuals in the education sector over the years.
Peachy himself has some experience of how Trevor Mallard takes criticism of Government policy very personally indeed. And I wonder if there’s any truth in the rumour I’ve heard on the local grapevine that the call went out in union circles last year that any dirt on Rangitoto College in general, or Peachy in particular, would find a willing ear in *ahem* the right quarters…
But I guess that’s not the kind of political “bullying culture” mikeybill objects to.
December 7th, 2005 at 9:44 am
Mickey Bill, the Tories are on the ropes now. So we have Peachy, who is a bureacrat who received his education and School salary via the NZ taxpayer.
This so called educator, leader of the community, comes out with a barage of blunders like this.
He has no credibility in my opinion!
And this brainless twit was selected, by the NZ National party as a candidate.
DPB, is bad enough, but this! I wonder what else will come out about Peachy?
The pair of them should be tossed out of the Parliament, once and for all!
December 7th, 2005 at 9:58 am
And Helen and Michael et al have never bullied or threatened anyone? Go pull the other one At this time of year it plays Jingle Bells
December 7th, 2005 at 11:08 am
“What the hell sort of behavior is this?
Taking responsibility? Acknowledging error? Saying SORRY????”
Yeah, you should be disgusted mate. I mean, you’d never make comments suggesting you wished somebody was dead and then fail to apologise for it, would you?
Oops.
http://blognz.com/mt/mt-comm.cgi?entry_id=12678
December 7th, 2005 at 11:31 am
selwyn has been a shit school for decades. peachey was being most unpolitical. straight up front. Peachey is absolutely on the right track. good on the fella for being straight up. dont tell me I dont know selwyn. I went to school there. far far far too liberal
December 7th, 2005 at 9:00 pm
“dont tell me I dont know selwyn. I went to school there’
Of course you did, but in 99.9% of cases a problem such as yours is cogenital.
December 7th, 2005 at 10:26 pm
Mikey Bill, as a former student of Rangitoto College while Mr Peachey was principal there, I know for a fact that bullying was definitely not a problem. He was a great principal and did great things for that school. He made sure there was no bullying culture at his school. I feel very lucky to have been a student there while he was principal.
December 8th, 2005 at 11:15 am
It’s pretty obvious the knife statement was metaphorical, not literal. But it’s still disturbing. What did Peachey mean? Does he want to get rid of White?
I can see why, as a former Selwyn student myself. It’s a school that makes no bones about being liberal and bitter on conservative government. I disagree that it was a shit place. Like all schools it was good for some people, bad for others.
People like me, who were academic and sporty, didn’t feel especially valued. But it had a really strong arts culture, and that’s excellent. Great music, great art departments. Academically it’s somewhere in the middle – I didn’t feel ‘discouraged’ there, but I didn’t feel like I got special treatment either.
In hindsight, that was a wise strategy. Being treated as some kind of academic legend is a teaching philosophy that falls completely flat as soon as you leave school.
I can see why National would be bitter on it, since it promotes things they would see as horribly PC, like valuing all kinds of subjects. I recall there were upwards of 60 different subjects to choose from in 6th form, many of which don’t lead directly to careers. And that was in the 80s.
But I can’t see it’s the place of a powerful MP to be making any kind of threats to a principal of a school. That’s just out of place and scary. If the Nats are bitter on Selwyn they should send their kids somewhere else. There’s plenty of grammar schools that are National strongholds. It amazes me that Peachey could be so indiscreet, especially in response to the rather generous offer to be involved in a school prizegiving.
Sagenz, why didn’t you just go somewhere else? There are dozens of schools you could have gone to instead. I agree that it was liberal, but everyone knew that before they went there. It used to shit me off too sometimes, but when you’re a kid, most adults shit you off.
December 9th, 2005 at 11:00 am
Hmm, he may technically have given a personal explanation, but he hasn’t really explained anything.
He claims it was an accident, but I don’t really see how that’s possible, unless he’s got the ‘knife in back’ comment stored as a macro or autocomplete and hit that instead of yours sincerely…
But that would be very very weird…
Cock-up yes, brain spasm, yes, accident? no way.
December 10th, 2005 at 2:58 am
As an ex student of Selwyn I was disgusted with Mr Peachys comments. I had Carol White as a teacher and she was fantastic. The fact is not eveyone fits into the rigid mainstream schooling that Mr Peachy seems to be so in favour of(not all of us looked up to the first XV) If it wasnt for schools like Selwyn I myself would have dropped out of school at the end of the 5th form, after being told by the principal of a well known
“mainstream” school, I did not fit the “mould” of what their pupils should be. Give me a break! Talk about a factory line of moulds pumping out robots who question nothing! And another thing if you enjoy NZ tv programmes, movies, music, art etc etc, you would be out of luck if schools like Selwyn did not exist. Half the people involved in those industries went to Selwyn. Basically school to some students is about alot more than english, maths,science and of course Rugby!
December 11th, 2005 at 9:14 pm
Amanda, I remember they actually disbanded the rugby team as a protest against apartheid, during my time there! It came back a little later, after the All Black tour of SA was stopped. Apartheid fell a couple of years later.
I thought it was over the top at the time, punishing school kids wanting to enjoy the national sport (all 12 of them), but I could see, and approved of, the point they were trying to make.
I was also very surprised at Peachey’s comment. Only because he was so stupidly indiscreet as to make it. That he thinks like that is no surprise at all.
December 17th, 2005 at 9:54 pm
Amazing to see Peachey at it again in today’s NZ Herald. The ability of a school to meet the needs of the local and wider stake holders is the duty of the elected Board of Trustees. The Board of Trustees is also responsible for appointment and performance of the principal(s).
Why is he undermining this?
Also why is Peter Ayson of Meadowbank School again quoted on this – is inter-school war principal against principal professionally acceptable to the families of NZ?
December 18th, 2005 at 12:04 pm
Ask Clem Simich whether Peachy’s knife in the back is metaphorical ?
Poor Clem left to run as the national candidate for Mangere, the seat with the largest labour majority. The humiliation, even Tim Barclay would turn down an opportunity like that. Nothing gets in the way of the new headmaster-in-chief !