David Seymour: 'Completely unacceptable' civil servants appeared in campaign ad

The Labour Party is re-editing a Facebook video after complaints about it featuring Dr Ashley Bloomfield. The video showed The Prime Minister visiting the Institute of Environmental Science and Research with the Director-General of Health. A spokeswoman for Ardern denies it was a Labour campaign ad. But ACT Leader David Seymour says the fact it featured a public servant is completely unacceptable. "There's no question Labour put a video of Jacinda Ardern and Ashley Bloomfield at the Ministry of Health out on Facebook as part of their campaign." He told The Weekend Collective that it the visit to the ESR was a "Labour Party film opportunity", and if any other party attempted to do that, they'd be turned down. "When you have the civil service helping one side or another win an election, that is banana republic stuff." Seymour questions if the civil servants that featured in the ad had any choice of appearing in the ad. A Labour Party spokesperson says that no rules were broken with the ad, but Seymour says that the Cabinet manual specifies civil service can't be politicised. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.