Barry Maggie: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBarry Maggie: General Debate[Sitting date: 19 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:16082. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): There is something really rotten going on in the Labour Party at the moment. No I am not talking about its leadership although you do have to ask yourself where its top three are. Cunliffe Parker and Robertson are nowhere to be seen today.Mr SPEAKER: Order! It is just out of order to refer to the absence of members within the Chamber.MAGGIE BARRY: Certainly. But there is a silence from the Labour leadership which makes a change from the sorts of gaffes that it is normally associated with. I could talk today about Labour’s total lack of policies that will grow our economy. I could dwell on those members’ financial mismanagement—buying the votes with the baby bonus. It is all very fertile ground for dwelling on their failings but no. Today I am going to ask them to answer another case. It is one they are trying to duck and distance themselves from but I think they really need to stand up and answer questions about their role.I would like to ask them and especially their leader—for the time being anyway for today—David Cunliffe to explain his role as the puppet master of a Television New Zealand (TVNZ) head of department ShaneTaurima. This is a man who was head ofTVNZ’s Māori and Pacific unit and at times he was a front-line television news and current affairs interviewer. This is a series of positions that have given him unbridled power setting the agenda for news and current affairs programmes such asWakaHuia TeKarereand Marae Investigates. This is an individual whom his organisation TVNZ trusted.As you all know I think in this House at least he was the unsuccessful candidate for the by-election selection for Ikaroa-Rāwhiti. Then he went back to his old job at TVNZ saying when he was asked by his bosses that he was putting journalism ahead of politics. Well that was aTui billboard moment because as it turns out that was not so. What he was doing was that he was up to his neck in organising political meetings in the buildings of TVNZ.Dr Cam Calder: Whereabouts?MAGGIE BARRY: Indeed at TVNZ in Hobson Street in Auckland. I worked there for many years myself. In fact I worked in television news and current affairs for the State broadcaster for both Radio New Zealand and television for the best part of 30 years. It would never have happened then—absolutely never. We had journalistic principles we had fair balance we had integrity and we did not overstep the mark. This man did. When he was asked by his employers at TVNZ whether he had chosen journalism over politics he said journalism. Their only mistake in this in my view is that they trusted him. They took him at his word because he had been in the job for 12 years and he was somebody whom they thought knew which way was up. Well as it turns out he did not.His staff also have a case to answer because they used their TVNZ emails to organise branch meetings in the building of TVNZ. All of this is terrible. It is a disgrace actually. TVNZ—because the Minister of Broadcasting Craig Foss has asked them as well—are calling a review into this. They are very disappointed and admit that in retrospect they should not have reappointed him to that job. But I ask the Labour Party this and in particular David Cunliffe and the leadership such as it is in Labour: what was their role in all of this? What were they doing allowing this to happen? We have Mr Cunliffe an individual who perhaps was about to be the new boss of MrTaurima. Did he give him assurances that he would get the nod at the next candidates’ selection that he was contesting? Were there undertakings given that his bosses-to-be at the Labour Party would give him favourable treatment? It could really be a battle of twoShanes could it not if he does go against Shane Jones. And he has declared prettymuch that he is going to be doing that. I think it is “ShamefulShanes” times two—[Interruption] It is all of the above Mr Calder—absolutely so.I think that when you have an individual who ought to know better who has made his living as supposedly an investigative current affairs journalist and news interviewer it is an absolute disgrace. In the 30-odd years I spent in the business somebody like him would not have been tolerated. I do not know how duplicitous he must have been or how arrogant he and his staff must have been to think that they could have got away with it.Someone like Paul Henry has been an individual who has a late-night show and it is a bit of an old chat show. He is a knownopinionator—a known guy to peddle his views and he is someone whom I suppose you could call a bit of a shock-jock really. ShaneTaurima on the other hand was a self-styled individual who had integrity and who supposedly held journalistic integrity close. I do not think he did. I think he has let his colleagues down. He has let the profession of journalism down.If Labour is foolish enough to allow an individual like that to be selected and allows someone as dishonourable as that to become a member of Parliament then it has outdone itself. I think and I put it to the House that ShaneTaurima having betrayed the professional journalism code of ethics—fairness impartiality honesty and integrity—is not a man who should be considered for higher office. David Cunliffe needs to be here to answer those questions about the role that he played in that situation. He has blood on his hands.