A sports broadcaster is lashing out at the incoming government, calling the length of the coalition negotiations "tiresome and embarrassing".
National, ACT and New Zealand First are still in coalition discussions a month after the election. On Wednesday the leaders met in person for the first time with NZ First' Winston Peters sharing a photo of him, Christopher Luxon and David Seymour.
While it was signalled a meeting of the three could take place in Wellington on Tuesday, Peters never showed, leading Luxon and Seymour to fly back to Auckland for Wednesday's rendezvous.
Speaking with AM on Wednesday, sports broadcaster Brendan Telfer said the fact Aotearoa still doesn't have a government a month on from the election makes him embarrassed.
"It's tiresome and I feel almost embarrassed as a New Zealander that here we are now, I think it's just over a month since the election, we do not have a government," Telfer told AM.
"When you put that to Winston Peter's he comes back with the standard reply, 'Well look in Germany it can take four or five months of coalition talks'.
"Germany is a country of 80-odd million people, we're five million. I would like someone to tell me if they can think of another country, a so-called democracy, of five million people that can't form a government a month after the election, I can't think of one.
"It's just tiresome and embarrassing," he added.
Political commentator Trish Sherson, who was appearing alongside Telfer on AM, said the parties actually share a lot of common ground and it's key they're able to form a strong, stable government.
"We have to wait and see but personally I just want the baby, not the labour pains. I get the feeling a lot of people, by the time we got to the election, were totally over politics," Sherson told AM.
"They wanted the parties who were chosen to form a government to go away and get on with it and come back and tell us what it is.
"I think the scrutiny and judgement on that coalition agreement will rightly be very tough. Again, just in my view, that coalition agreement must be the foundation of a strong and stable government. It has to reflect all of the electorate for positive change and in effect all of those parties who are in the agreement need to be clear that they are an accelerator, not a handbrake and that what they're asking for in those negotiations has to be proportionate."
The meeting on Wednesday seems to be the first sign an agreement may be on the cards. National leader Christopher Luxon called it a "good meeting" in a post on social media. "There's still work to do - but making serious progress to forming a government to deliver for Kiwis," the National leader said.
Seymour said: "A government is forming. ACT is here to ensure it is a government of real change."
