Smith pens letter declining Junior Minister role, questions Premier’s leadership
Lorna Smith has confirmed she was offered a junior ministerial position for Financial Services following her dismissal as Deputy Premier and outlined her reasons for rejecting the role.
2024-11-13 17:44:45 - VI News Staff
In an October 28 response letter to Premier Natalio Wheatley, released this morning, Wednesday, November 13, Smith responded to the offer while expressing her concerns with Wheatley’s leadership. She wrote: “I formally thank you — but decline — your extraordinary and confusing offer to me subsequent to dismissing me. Despite dismissing me publicly as Deputy Premier, removing me from Cabinet, and removing me as Minister for Financial Services, Labour, and Trade, you offered me those same portfolios but as a Junior Minister. I declined this offer then, and now do so formally.”
Smith noted she valued her roles as Deputy Premier and a minister but declined the new offer for three reasons. First, she said the Premier’s offer reinforced her belief that he still considered her the best-qualified candidate for the roles, showing that her dismissal was based not on performance but, in her view, on Wheatley’s “increasingly tenuous grip on power and support within Cabinet.” “You stated my dismissal was because you felt a possible lack of support in the imminent vote of No Confidence against you. I want to address that clearly: The House represents democracy at work. It should never be used as a mechanism for a premier found wanting to ignore the voice of the people, expressed through a no-confidence vote of the House, and remain in power. Despite my position and concerns, I indicated as recently as Wednesday, October 16, that I would stand with you in the interest of stability for the country,” Smith wrote.