Neil Sands
Hutt South MP Chris Bishop has been named Attorney-General in a pre-Easter Cabinet reshuffle but has lost his roles as Leader of the House and the National Party’s campaign chair.
Chris Bishop
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said Bishop, who has a first-class honours degree in law from Victoria University of Wellington, would do an exceptional job in the position of Attorney-General, which is being vacated by Judith Collins KC, who is leaving politics to become president of the Law Commission.
“Attorney-General of New Zealand is a really important role, given the amount of legislation we have going on, a bunch of changes that we have happening,” Luxon said.
“He’s uniquely qualified, with his own legal background, to understand that we need to drive change at Crown Law. We need to make sure we get a new, highly performing Solicitor-General [Anna Adams KC], who will take up the position on May 11]. There’s a lot of work in that space… As an experienced person from Parliament [Bishop] has great understanding and appreciation of constitutional issues and the law.”
In addition to Attorney-General, Bishop will retain the portfolios of housing, infrastructure, transport and RMA reform, which Luxon said fitted together well as the government seeks to overhaul the planning regime.
He also holds the role of Associate Finance Minister but his position as Associate Sports Minister has been scrapped because Luxon said it was no longer needed.
Luxon denied that taking away the roles of Leader of the House and campaign chair was a way of punishing Bishop, and rejected any suggestion that Bishop had been running the numbers against him late last year, when there were questions about Luxon’s leadership.
“I reject the characterisation of that question completely… It’s just acknowledging he’s had a massive workload, it’s no secret,” Luxon said.
Christopher Luxon
Asked how Bishop responded when informed of the changes, he said: “I can tell you, we had a very positive conversation last night, and he and I are incredibly aligned.”
Louise Upston replaces Bishop as Leader of the House and Simeon Brown takes over as National campaign chairman.
Chris Penk is promoted to Cabinet and takes on some of the other portfolios Collins held: defence, space and Minister for the Intelligence Services GCSB and SIS.
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith picks up another Collins portfolio, Minister for the Public Service, and also becomes Minister for Pacific peoples.
Nicola Grigg gets the environment portfolio which was previously held by Penny Simmons, who takes on science and tertiary education
Newly appointed campaign chairman Brown also takes the energy portfolio off Simon Watts, handing his role as Minister for Auckland to Watts.
Cameron Brewer become Minister for Commerce & Consumer Affairs, replacing Scott Simpson, who takes on statistics.
Brewer also becomes Minister for Small Business & Manufacturing, while Mike Butterick becomes Minister for Land Information.
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