Brown Peter: General Debates 
Brown Peter: General Debates 
[Volume:607;Page:4975] 
PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 If it were question time I would be asking that member if he wanted some Valium. Question time in this House yesterday afternoon was an absolute farce. The Prime Minister was asked about her comments on President Bush Al Gore and the Iraq war and she evaded the issue like nothing else. Today was a little better—we got a little bit of information but it was like drawing teeth to get that information. Some will say that it was a good performance—a brilliant performance—by the Prime Minister. Others will say that it was a disgrace. 
As members are well aware I was recently in London and I witnessed the British Prime Minister’s half-hour question time. For members’ information in that half-hour the Prime Minister faced some really tough questions. The House was full with over 400 members—although there are 659 members the House only accommodates 400. Only once did the Speaker have to intervene on a point of order. The questions were tough and penetrating both from the Opposition and from the Labour Party. Members might like to know that over the war in Iraq 122 Labour Party members voted against their Prime Minister on one occasion and on a latter occasion 139 voted against him. But Prime Minister Blair’s performance was absolutely straight up. He addressed the issue straight up and we could do with a little bit more of that in this House. That is what we are here for—to ask the hard questions and get them answered. The member over there who is interjecting should get a video of Tony Blair. He stands for one half-hour per week and answers the toughest questions that anybody can put to him but here we get evasion and fob-offs. He answers those questions thoroughly. I do not necessarily believe that Tony Blair has more ability than our Prime Minister but the attitude is far removed. Mr Blair takes the world on whether one agrees or disagrees with him. He takes the questions and gives the answers. 
Before I left here my impression was that had there been what is known as the second United Nations resolution we would have been in war; we would have been over there. Labour members might contradict that but at that point in time our Prime Minister was saying that we needed to get the second resolution and gave the impression that New Zealanders would make a commitment to the war in Iraq if that had been obtained. Had Tony Blair obtained that second resolution—which as we all know the French vetoed and announced that they would veto from day one—I would have been a firm supporter of New Zealand standing toe-to-toe with the British and the Americans in the war in Iraq. 
But I come back to the way we operate in this House. I believe that we should take an overview of how we do things here. It simply is not good enough. This country will go through a period of economic downturn if we are not careful and some tough questions will need answering and they will need to be answered forthrightly and honestly. 
Jill Pettis 
: When will that member be the leader? 
PETER BROWN 
: I cannot hear what the member over there is saying. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It is a bit early in the day for Winston. 
PETER BROWN 
: I do not know whether those comments are called for but I will answer the member’s question. Mr Peters is much in demand in this country and he has gone somewhere where they appreciate frank and straight answers. By and large that is something that that Government over there does not even know how to approach. The answering of questions in this House is a good deal less than competent. It is about time that Ministers took stock of their own attempts at answering questions and maybe as I said earlier get a video of Tony Blair and look at it 100 times a day.