Bolger and Moore on Q+A

Former Prime Ministers Jim Bolger and Mike Moore were interviewed on Q+A this morning. It was an interesting contrast of approaches - Bolger argued for small, incremental changes, while Moore pushed his long-standing Constitutional Convention Bill, which looks at all and sundry constitutional issues.

The problem with Moore's proposal is that it doesn't actually intend to produce a result. While it does set out a deliberative process for constitutional change, and that should be welcomed, by trying to change everything at once it would probably succeed in changing nothing. New Zealand deserves better than that.

Bolger was on the money. Traditionally changes to our constitutional make up have been incremental. The panel's response was interesting. Stephen Franks, Jon Johannson and Margaret Mutu all had, as you'd expect, very different perspectives. Mutu's contribution to reveal one interesting tidbit: a constitutional working group within the Iwi Leaders Forum.

Update: transcript of the interview is here.