Minister Andrew Hoggard on facing colleagues’ mirth as detached retina forces eye-patch use

Stories of one-eyed farmers might be common in political circles but now the Government officially has one with minister and dairy farmer Andrew Hoggard forced to wear an eye-patch after surgery for a detached retina.

Hoggard is copping the jokes in good spirits and says he’s getting more fatigued by having to repeatedly explain his quite obvious black eye-patch over his right eye than he is the pirate-themed humour coming his way.

Alongside amusing his colleagues, Hoggard says the injury – which he believes was caused by a punch to the face he received while playing rugby – is a timely reminder to get checked, given the politician came within months of losing sight in his eye entirely.

The extent of the damage to Hoggard’s eye was revealed during a recent visit to the optometrist he’d been “putting off for a few months”.

An indication of an issue had been detected a few years ago but the latest appointment found it had progressed, with his vision in his right eye being limited “like a blind going down”, meaning he couldn’t see his hand above his eyeline without his uninjured eye.

Hoggard then saw a specialist on Monday, April 15, when he was told he had a detached retina. He was at hospital on the Wednesday and had surgery on the Friday.

“[It was] scary as hell because I’ve never been under general anaesthetic ever before, I’ve had nothing other than stitches before in my life,” he told the Herald.

“The last thing I remember was talking to the anaesthetist about effing bloody mongrel [rugby] locks and then it was, ‘Mr Hoggard, wake up’.”

The Act MP’s distaste for locks originated from his theory of where he got the injury.

Given his relatively injury-free life, Hoggard assumed it must have been caused when he was punched in the face, splitting the skin underneath his eye, while in the middle of a scrum playing as a prop for Manawatū’s Ōroua Rugby Club about 20 years ago. The perpetrator was one of the locks in the opposing Te Kawau team.

“We were just smashing them in the scrums, push-over try and all the rest of it, so that was how they responded to getting monstered.

“It was like sheep farmers from the hills which I was a part of, even though I was a dairy farmer, versus all the dairy farmers down on the flats, so you can imagine the animosity.”

Unfortunately for Hoggard, he never played the lock again as a subsequent back injury led to his retirement from the sport.

However, the decades-old injury did complicate the former Federated Farmers chief executive’s current occupation, now Minister for Biosecurity and Food Safety.

The copious amount of reading was a challenge, given his functional eye has always been the weaker one.

Driving was also off the cards as direct sunlight further impaired his vision.

Another drawback was the regular ribbing from his parliamentary colleagues, with his favourites including being called a “one-eyed dairy farmer” and facing accusations of “turning a blind eye to farmer pollution”.

“I’m sure there’ll be truckloads, there’s been a few pirate jokes.”

Hoggard said many of his Act colleagues had been keenly waiting for their leader David Seymour’s joke of choice.

Known for priding himself on witty one-liners, Seymour reportedly let down his caucus by simply approaching Hoggard on his right-hand side and checking whether he could be seen.

“It wasn’t one of his better ones,” Hoggard laughed.

He wasn’t sure how long the eye patch was needed but Hoggard appeared comfortable with persisting until his eye recovered.

He said the experience had taught him a valuable lesson.

“I was probably only a year or maybe even months away from going completely blind in that eye.

“That was a good wake-up call to make sure you always stick to check-ups.”

Adam Pearse is a political reporter in the NZ Herald Press Gallery team, based at Parliament. He has worked for NZME since 2018, covering sport and health for the Northern Advocate in Whangārei before moving to the Herald in Auckland, covering Covid-19 and crime.