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Awkward: Health Minister David Clark shifts border fiasco blame to Ashley Bloomfield

June 25, 2020

The Health Minister continues to be questioned about issues with quarantine testing, but he is passing responsibility to his officials.

Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield was forced to watch on awkwardly yesterday as Health Minister David Clark shifted responsibility for the quarantine testing fiasco.

There have been a litany of problems in managing the testing of New Zealanders returning to the country and spending time in managed isolation.

Some people have been granted compassionate leave without being tested.

A senior military officer has since been brought in to help sort the situation out.

Outside a select committee at Parliament yesterday, where both Dr Clark and Dr Bloomfield appeared, the politician was asked if he took responsibility for the failures.

"The Director-General has accepted that protocols weren't being followed, he has accepted responsibility for that and has set about putting it right," Dr Clark said, as the senior public servant stood behind him.

He was repeatedly asked why he didn't take any responsibility, to which he replied: "The Director-General has already acknowledged that the system didn't deliver here."

At a press conference yesterday afternoon, Dr Bloomfield, who has largely been hailed for his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic in this country, said he still had a good working relationship with Dr Clark, who twice breached lockdown restrictions to take his family to the beach and go mountain biking in Dunedin. 

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