King Annette: General Debate 
King Annette: General Debate 
[Volume:650;Page:18702] 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Justice) 
: 
 I tell the people of New Zealand that they have just been listening to a member talk nothing but a load of rot. In fact Bill English has become Parliament’s “Mr Boo-hoo Cry-baby”. He is on his feet every minute that he can to take a point of order because he cannot take the heat in this Parliament. He has never been able to take the heat in this Parliament. He will be taking a point of order in a moment because he does not like the truth. 
The behaviour in this Parliament over the past few weeks reminds me of the title of that book  
Through the 
Looking Glass 
. The public have been looking through that glass and they are disgusted at the daily diet of cakes and circuses they are getting from the National Party. 
Hon Bill English 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I just wondered what happened to the big brave threat from Trevor Mallard to disrupt my speech with points of order. Perhaps he is not up to it in the way that he used to be. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: It is not in order to break up a member’s speech with a frivolous comment that is not a point of order. Thank you. 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: The member who has just tried to break up my speech will now disappear from this place because he cannot take the heat. “Mr 20 Percent” led the National Party to its worst ever defeat in this Parliament— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: In 100 years. 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: —in 100 years. You know the public of New Zealand are disgusted at the daily diet of cakes and circuses from the National Party. They are appalled at the attempts of people like John Key and Bill English to be the ringmasters who manipulate public opinion. They are sceptical of the claims of the National Party that although every other party in Parliament is on the take National’s complicated webs of secret trusts secret donations and secret meetings are all lily-white. 
Let me tell the House this. Everybody knows that Owen Glenn donated to the Labour Party. Everybody knows that because he said so we said so and we declared it. But who donated to the National Party’s secret trust? Was it Fay Richwhite? Did it donate to National? Did people donate who were buying the policies that are now being leaked every day? Do we know what that money is for? We do not have a clue because donations to National are so secret and so hidden that all one can say when hearing from those members is that it is nothing more than two-faced cant. We know that they received close to $2 million before the last election from their secret donors. Not one of those donations was disclosed to the public. 
People out there see through the daily political farce from the National Party. They know the National Party needs the sideshows. It needs to have them featured on TV night after night and on the talkbacks because any scrutiny of its flimsy policy would have the public asking: “Change to what?”. That is what the public are saying. The public do not trust National. Members can just take the TV3 poll as an example. Fifty percent of New Zealanders do not trust the National Party not to have a secret agenda. 
Ladies and gentlemen National has a secret agenda; members should make no bones about that. Members heard from my colleague Phil Goff about John Key trying to cover up part of that secret agenda. John Key could not answer straight up and down as to whether he had met Lord Ashcroft. He had to um and ah about it. It took Duncan Garner three questions to get it out of him but finally John Key admitted that he had met with Lord Ashcroft. Then he was asked: “Did you approach him or did he approach you?” and he replied: “Oh I’m not sure of the answer to that. It was in my diary so I just went. I saw him. I am not quite sure who set it up.” John Key also said exactly that about the Exclusive Brethren. He said the Exclusive Brethren had an appointment in his diary he did not know who set it up and he does not even remember whether he met with them. 
John Key was then asked: “Do you recall whether Lord Ashcroft rang you or you rang him?”. Well of course a question like that is a major question for the Privileges Committee at this very moment but does John Key remember whether Lord Ashcroft rang him or whether it was the other way round? He said: “Well it could have been arranged by my …”—and he could not remember what the “my” was—and then he said he just followed what was in his diary. Well can members believe that? 
Today John Key accused the Prime Minister of knowing about Winston Peters’ donation. Well let us just see what John Key said about donations to his own party when he was asked. He said: “I don’t know who donates to the National Party. Of course one knows who donates …”.