Hide Rodney: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Hide Rodney: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:649;Page:17757] 
5.  
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
 to the  
Minister of Foreign Affairs 
: What further action if any has he taken since I first asked last week to ensure Governments in the Pacific region are honest transparent and accountable? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Minister of Foreign Affairs) 
: 
 As I travel around New Zealand many people say to me: “Winston you’ve been in politics a long time; you must know some good political jokes.” and I say: “Rodney Hide.” The fact of the matter is that National members gave this question over to Rodney Hide today—I say to those thousands of people who are watching this broadcast from Parliament—because they were not prepared to ask it themselves. He might be impersonating a canary in this House but National members should be wearing the yellow jackets today of course. I have asked my officials to keep promoting democracy and accountable government in the Pacific. 
Rodney Hide 
: Will the Minister of Foreign Affairs take the opportunity he has now in advancing honesty and transparency in Government in the Pacific to put on record in this House what he told the public of New Zealand—that New Zealand First has received no donations from Simunovich Fisheries contrary to what the  
Dominion Post 
 claims today? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Anyone who read the  
Dominion Post 
 today saw in paragraph 3 a barefaced allegation. There was not one fact and there was no evidence and no proof but the media in this country were happy to follow him regardless of his not giving them the courtesy of one detail to back up the allegation. It is drivel—typical of the last allegation as well when they talked about $120000 being in one or more cheques. They did not provide the evidence. There were no facts and no substance—just allegation. Anyone can see that this is the allegation of a campaign financed by certain people in this country who have been about this for a long time. I am bound to give members the good news—those people are not going to succeed. 
Rodney Hide 
: Will the Minister now take the opportunity to deny in this House what he told the public of New Zealand—that New Zealand First has never received a donation from Simunovich Fisheries; if he will not deny it what is the reason? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Members well know that questions must be addressed and related to ministerial responsibility. The way in which that supplementary question was framed meant that it was to the Minister in his capacity as a party leader. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I can say this though on the question of honesty transparency and accountability—particularly in view of the need for sartorial standards—I have spoken to some people in Epsom and told them not to elect a member who represents a party that has for many years secretly channelled millions of dollars from big business through trusts such as the Cargill Trust which paid $2.9 million to ACT in one year. When the leader of the ACT party was questioned about the trust he said that he did not know about it until he read about it in a newspaper article. 
Rodney Hide 
: What can the public of New Zealand conclude about the credibility of the Minister of Foreign Affairs who says: “No New Zealand First received no money from Simunovich Fisheries.” but is not prepared to advance— 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I know that this is a stalking horse for another campaign; it is so obvious. But he is not going to go outside the law—inside this House or outside it. Therefore I am asking you to bring him to order. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: No. All I am asking members to do is to comply with the Standing Orders when asking their questions. Those questions should relate to ministerial responsibility and not to the roles other members have outside this House. Ministerial responsibility is the key. 
Rodney Hide 
: Why will the Minister not enhance honesty transparency and accountability in the Pacific by repeating in this House what he told the public of New Zealand—that New Zealand First has received no donations from Simunovich— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: No—the first part of the question is fine but the second is not. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Madam Speaker—[ 
Interruption 
] 
Madam SPEAKER 
: No. I have ruled on this matter. Would both of you please be seated. You may think this is a circus but I do not and neither do the people of New Zealand. There are rules here. If you want to debate other matters you can do so outside question time. It is your right to do so. Here we have questions and those questions relate to ministerial responsibility. The first part of the question is fine; the reference to other roles is not. So I ask the Minister to address the first part. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: It is like taking candy from a baby. The reality of it is that I have been at pains to point out how transparency and democracy work around the Pacific. But more particularly I have some good examples. The following quote is from the previous leader of the ACT party who said when he was asked a question— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. You cannot shut down Mr Hide from asking a specific question about a matter that has been before this House—the matter has in fact been before the Privileges Committee—and then allow the Minister to rehearse a whole lot of answers that have nothing to do with his ministerial responsibility no matter how thinly he might couch his associations— 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: If Mr Brownlee could be slightly patient he would see in the words of these quotes why this is relevant. The quote begins: “In a free society …” and that is what we are talking about—free and open democracy. I want to give members the quote. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: If this were a free and open democracy the Minister would not be worried about hiding behind the Standing Orders so as to not answer the question. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Would the Minister address the question. As I heard the Minister got as far as giving examples before there was a point of order. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: The audience was stunned I might add when I gave this quote which reads like this: “In a free society people should be able to donate to whatever cause they like. If it is their own money it is nobody’s business—no business of the public.” That statement was made by Richard Prebble in respect of the $2.9 million in the Cargill Trust. [ 
Interruption 
] We are talking about the laws that applied then I say to Gerry—pay attention! When he was asked why that money had to be secret Mr Prebble added: “How am I supposed to answer that question?”. A lot of New Zealanders do not particularly want to be on the front page of the newspaper— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It would be an interesting I think piece of information you might give the House about how any of this answer relates to the Minister’s responsibilities either as the Minister for Racing or as the Minister of Foreign Affairs to whom the question is set down. He should not be allowed to get away with this Madam Speaker when you have been so very hard on Mr Hide. You did not allow Mr Hide to raise issues with the Minister of Foreign Affairs that are relevant about the way in which financial transactions— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I have heard enough from the member. I am not being hard on any particular member; I am being hard in the sense of trying to ensure that the Standing Orders are complied with. The member asked a very broad question and the Minister was addressing that question—the exchanges were both broad; I accept that. We could rule them out of order but I have not done so because I think there is an element of ministerial responsibility in terms of the approach that has been taken. The Minister was responding with quotes on that so that is the situation we have. 
Taito Phillip Field 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Perhaps you could clarify for me Madam Speaker in relation to the premise of the question: since when was the New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs responsible for the honesty and transparency of Governments in the Pacific? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: The Minister has a responsibility about matters that relate to Pacific countries and those matters in previous questions have also related to Government policy there. Of course the member is right in terms of the strict sense of that that the Minister is not responsible. But in terms of the way in which the questions have been framed I think they have so far come within ministerial responsibility in a broad interpretation. 
Rodney Hide 
: Would the Minister not conclude that in the past week there has been a backward step in accountability transparency and honesty in the Pacific because to take an analogy we have a Minister who tells the people that no donation was received from Simunovich Fisheries— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I am sorry—the member knows. He will please bring the question within ministerial responsibility. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. If Mr Peters can use an example—an unintelligible example actually; Lewis Carroll would have been better—to try to answer his question why cannot Mr Hide use the same process for getting an answer to his question? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Because the first question drew matters to a role that is outside the Standing Orders in terms of responsibility in question time. Analogies are used and I know— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Point of order— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I am on my feet! Would members please just stick to the Standing Orders both those asking the questions and those answering them—I have stopped both of you at times. 
Rodney Hide 
: Would the Minister consider with his vast experience of foreign affairs and the finance of political parties that it would be a backwards step in a Pacific nation if a political leader and Minister were to deny ever receiving a donation when the newspaper in the capital city said that that member’s party did and when given the opportunity in the nation’s Parliament the member refused to repeat the denial because we have learnt from this experience in this far-flung nation of the Pacific that “No” means “Yes” “Yes” means “No” and he is an “Alice in Wonderland”? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: That reminds me of nothing so much as the old English saying: “I shot an arrow into the air; whither it landed I knew not where”. You see the kind of thing that we saw in the  
Dominion Post 
 today is typical of a sleaze campaign. Let me tell members this. I take the story of Bob Jones. The only independent witness Professor Malcolm Wright said “One I was not in the room; two I was angry when I came into the room and found out that the subject had been raised; and three I was not present when there was any cheque paid out.” That is the story gone and dusted. Mind you it was in “Granny Herald” of course after 5 days of rumour and innuendo. 
Rodney Hide 
: What would the Minister conclude about a far-flung island nation in the Pacific where a Minister was quite happy to deny political donations but when asked in Parliament— 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I was hoping that a gracious providence would intervene but I have to resort to asking you to do so. This is ridiculous shameful and disgraceful. No one should be allowed to make such an idiot of himself in this House. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: People are free to present themselves however they like as long as it is within the Standing Orders. Have you finished your oration Mr Hide? 
Rodney Hide 
: Hardly started Madam Speaker. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: That is the problem. Be seated! You are turning this place into a farce and it is not in the public interest to do so. Questions are to be short and succinct—not speeches—and answers are to relate directly to the question. We will have that now—a short and succinct question and a short answer please. 
Rodney Hide 
: What would the Minister conclude if in the Pacific a Government Minister would go out in public and deny ever receiving a political donation but would not make that denial in Parliament where it mattered? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Frankly the ACT party should change its leader if that is the best it can do. The member has come to this House he has not provided one shred of ammunition or evidence yet he demands I give answers to allegations made by a fish-and-chip throwaway newspaper and a rather follicly-challenged lying editor. I will tell members what that editor did about democracy. We had a candidate once a doctor— 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I ask you to reflect on where the answer is going here. It was a very succinct question from Rodney Hide I thought after your direction to him. The Minister is making no attempt to address the question asked. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I ask the Minister to address the question succinctly. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I will. This doctor a New Zealand First candidate was accused on the front page of the Christchurch  
Press 
 of rorting the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC)—on the front page. I demanded an ACC inquiry and 4 days later it exonerated him and said that rather than ripping off ACC he had delivered four times the services. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. This question was not about the editor of the  
Dominion Post 
— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I know. You are quite right. Would the Minister just address the question. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I will—precisely: I am not going to respond to a dirty underhand media campaign. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Mr Peters was simply asked to respond to a legitimate question from Mr Hide that related to how he as Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Pacific would view the activities of another Foreign Minister in the Pacific who was prepared to say outside the House that he did not receive a donation but was not prepared to say so inside the House. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I get the point. But the Minister did address the question; we should be grateful for that. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: Has the Minister seen any other reports of a lack of honesty and transparency in the South Pacific? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh yes most certainly. Yesterday I tabled a document but I did not mention the man who signed it. His name was Sir Bob Jones. He was alleging that $20000 was paid by him to the ACT party and never declared. Why would not one media person be interested in that? Well the media has a spurious campaign going on against one party and its leader which it is bound to lose. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: Is there any other action the Minister needs to take to ensure accountability in the South Pacific? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Yes. I saw a coterie of New Zealand’s richest men secretly bankroll a political party in 1996 in a scheme set up to avoid disclosure of their identity and the amount of their donations. Over $2.8 million was paid into an undeclared trust now known as the Cargill Trust. This dwarfs—massively—any donations made to New Zealand First. But of course it went to the dwarf. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: That last comment was uncalled for. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: Can the Minister give us another example of transparency and accountability in the South Pacific? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Most certainly. When it is alleged in an electoral court that push-polling took place by a whole lot of Exclusive Brethren and it is denied by legal counsel but it is later admitted to by the very candidate who was a beneficiary of that and who would not be here had that cost been put on to his account then we are looking at perjury—a most serious crime for which one is capable of getting 5 years in prison. 
Rodney Hide 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Thank you for that. I think that actually we did have an answer to my question. It took a while but I think the answer was very clear. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: It is not for you to judge.