The terrible personal cost

Most will have seen by now (I’ve been flat out since 6 am doing media interviews, dropping Ben off to daycare and a regular session with my trainer, so hence only blogging now) the article on Newsroom where four women speak out about their experiences with Jami-Lee Ross.

This self-inflicted scandal is taking a terrible human toll. I’ll focus on the politics in another post, but I find it really sad the damage that has been done.

• Jami-Lee’s career is destroyed and he may not even be employable in NZ. He’s gone from being a newly promoted front bencher to a pariah
• His wife has the humiliation of what should be private matters between them laid out in public
• His children will grow up with articles on the Internet about their father’s relationships with other women. As a father this upsets me greatly. No kid should have to endure that.
• The four women in the article have obviously been through a horrible experience. I’m not the most sensitive soul out there but I found it hard to read the article. It impacted me emotionally. Forget politics. Those women have had a terrible time.
• In at least one case, a marriage has split up and you’ll have a husband and children hurting
• Simon Bridges has had someone who was one of his closest mates in caucus secretly tape record him. That is a huge betrayal of trust. Forget the politics. How would you feel if one if your mates did that to you?
• Maureen Pugh has been humiliated by the release of the tape with a harsh description of her. She is incredibly upset, as is her family. And those who have campaigned for her and supported her are also upset. Maureen’s public response has been magnanimous and classy. But’s let’s not pretend how terrible she must feel.
• 40,000 National Party members and supporters are upset. The vast majority of these people don’t want to be MPs. They don’t expect to gain anything in return for their hard work door knocking, donating, delivering etc. They just think that New Zealand does better when National is in Government. They feel betrayed and disappointed that this fiasco undermines their hard work

So there is a terrible personal cost to all this. It is very sad and I hope it stops.

Despite the anger at what Jami-Lee has done, a lot of people are genuinely worried for him. He needs support. While obviously the media will be seeking comment from him, I hope they do so in a way which doesn’t add to the immense pressure he must be under. I mean this most sincerely. I’m not saying this to be snarky.

I really hope Jami-Lee doesn’t contest the by-election. I think it would be an awful experience for him, and humiliating.

Most of all I hope things deescalate, not get worse. Time for everyone to take a deep breath and step back. Enough damage has been done.