Hipkins Chris: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hipkins Chris: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 21 March 2012. Volume:678;Page:1161. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) 
: 
 Today is quite a sad day for Parliament. It is a sad day for the Government. I think it is a particularly sad day for the Government because today is the day when the Prime Minister stood up and told the House that the  
Cabinet Manual  
does not matter—that the provisions in the  
Cabinet Manual  
do not matter and that he is not going to enforce the standards of behaviour required by the  
Cabinet Manual 
. 
Back in December 2008 John Key said that he expected high standards from his Ministers and that if they did not meet the standards that he set then he would take action as necessary. That was in December 2008. How does that contrast with what he was saying just a day or two ago—in fact yesterday—when he said “If you are going to sack ministers for what I think he would accept as an error of judgment but not a terribly significant one you’d be sacking a lot of Ministers.”? 
So how many other Ministers in his Cabinet does he think do not have the judgment to be Ministers and why is he not sacking them? Why is he not sticking to his December 2008 comment when he said that he was going to set high standards for his Ministers? That has gone out the window now and it seems that Ministers can go into bat for people in their own ministerial portfolios—for people whom they are friends with—and John Key does not have a problem with that. 
John Key has never been good at managing conflicts of interest. Conflicts of interest are rife in this Government and John Key does not care about that. We saw that with Pansy Wong we saw that with Richard Worth and we saw that with many other Ministers in this Government and John Key does not care about the conflicts of interest. 
Let us look at what the  
Cabinet Manual  
says and at why John Key should hold his Ministers to account for it. Paragraph 2.59 of the  
Cabinet Manual  
is very clear: “Ministers themselves are responsible for proactively identifying and reviewing possible conflicts of interest and ensuring that any conflicts of interest are promptly addressed …”. That did not happen in this case. 
That did not happen in this case and John Key should have taken action earlier. He should not have waited for Nick Smith to resign. As soon as he found out that there was an issue he should have demanded that Nick Smith disclose to him all of the relevant information and then he should have taken action. He did not do that. 
He is the Prime Minister. He is responsible for Ministers’ conduct. The very first thing he should have done is say “Nick I want all of the relevant information. I want you to disclose for me every piece of correspondence.” and he did not do that. He did not exact from his Ministers the very high standards that he said he was going to exact from his Ministers before he became Prime Minister—or when he first became Prime Minister. He has lowered those standards. 
“A conflict may arise”—this is the  
Cabinet Manual 
 again—“if people close to a Minister such as a Minister’s family whanau or close associates might derive or be perceived as deriving some personal financial or other benefit from a decision or action by the Minister or the government.” That is clearly the case here. There is no question that when John Key saw the letter yesterday that Nick Smith had written he clearly should have known that that provision in the  
Cabinet Manual 
 had been violated and Nick Smith should have been stood down there and then. 
For the Prime Minister to come to the House today and say that having seen that letter yesterday—not what happened today; what happened yesterday—he was still comfortable with Nick Smith remaining as a Minister is simply not good enough. It was very clear yesterday what should have happened. The Prime Minister should have taken the right course of action and he did not do so. 
That is not acceptable from the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister promised New Zealanders higher standards of ministerial conduct and for 3½ years he has failed to live up to that promise. This is not the first time we have seen National Ministers with massive conflicts of interest and the Prime Minister not doing anything about it. 
There is another concern with this ACC case. It says that there is one rule for the National Party and its mates and another rule for all the rest of New Zealand. There are unresolved issues here. The question I have is: why is it that ACC officials—senior ACC officials—were meeting with Bronwyn Pullar in the first place? Why were they meeting? That does not happen with other ACC claimants. Why was it? There needs to be a full inquiry into this issue. Nick Smith’s resignation does not bring an end to the matter. There still needs to be an inquiry.