Brownlee Gerry: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Brownlee Gerry: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:625;Page:20040] 
3.  
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does her Government believe that John Tamihere should issue a public retraction in the interests of all New Zealanders? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
 on behalf of the 
 Prime Minister 
: Mr Tamihere expressed personal opinions that the Government has condemned and dissociated itself from. He has publicly acknowledged that his comments are unacceptable and he has offered a full apology. That is in the interests of all New Zealanders. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Why cannot the Prime Minister understand that whatever took place during the 15 minutes that John Tamihere was in the Labour caucus room does not constitute an apology and retraction to the thousands of New Zealanders who were offended by his comments about women and the Holocaust? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Mr Tamihere has actually stated his apology publicly. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Does the Prime Minister’s judgment then that no public retraction is needed mean that in her opinion a man who has been struck off for forgery who publicly lied about a golden handshake and who has offended women Jews gays the union movement and his own caucus colleagues is a good role model for Labour members of Parliament? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Prime Minister made clear that the views expressed by Mr Tamihere do not have any support within the Labour Party or the Labour caucus. But views similar to those on a number of those issues—certainly in relation to gays and members of the union movement—are expressed frequently by members opposite. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Are the statements in relation to accepting pain over pleasure when duty calls—statements included in a Latin media release sent out by Gerry Brownlee—a reference to Mr Tamihere or to a deputy leader under Dr Brash? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Although I have seen that material the Latin is so good I refuse to believe that it came from Mr Brownlee. 
Rodney Hide 
: Is it not a fact that Clayton Cosgrove was the managing director of the Mike Moore supporters’ club that the Prime Minister publicly named Clayton Cosgrove as orchestrating phone calls and demonstrations outside the houses of members of Parliament and complained of “a campaign of fear and intimidation” including “hate calls” to members of Parliament; and is that not the reason that the Prime Minister is not demanding a retraction because what John Tamihere said was the truth? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Prime Minister made it clear that she does not accept the accusations made about Mr Cosgrove’s action and she and Mr Cosgrove are of one mind on this matter. 
Dr the Hon Lockwood Smith 
: How does the Prime Minister intend explaining to her hosts at Auschwitz when she visits later this month that she did not require John Tamihere to retract his statement on the Holocaust? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Prime Minister has made it clear that the party and the Government dissociate themselves completely from those remarks. This party has a long proud history of opposing anti-Semitism. 
Rodney Hide 
: Was the Prime Minister then talking fantasy when she named Clayton Cosgrove as orchestrating phone calls pamphlet drops and demonstrations outside MPs’ houses in the  
National Business Review  
on 3 December 1993 and of claiming in the  
New Zealand Herald  
on 29 November 1993 that there was a “campaign of fear and intimidation” against her including “hate calls to MPs”? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I am happy to answer the question but what prime ministerial responsibility is there for statements made as Leader of the Opposition in 1993 about internal party matters? 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Madam Speaker if you were to rule that there is no prime ministerial responsibility for statements that the Prime Minister retracts as Prime Minister having made them as Leader of the Opposition then certainly the question asked by Mr Mallard earlier should not have been allowed to proceed either. I think that what Mr Hide has done is to point out that the Prime Minister said one thing when she was Leader of the Opposition and now conveniently faced by a political difficulty around John Tamihere she is trying to say another thing. 
Rodney Hide 
: The issue is this and it goes to the heart of the Prime Minister’s credibility. We have heard that the claim by Mr John Tamihere that Clayton Cosgrove organised hate calls was fantasy and that it did not happen and we have the Prime Minister saying admittedly before she was Prime Minister that that is exactly what happened. What I am doing is drawing it up and the point of it is that what she said as Prime Minister is what we are discussing. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I shall rule on the point of order. No party leader in the House is answerable for statements made in that capacity. I think that Mr Hide did not tie those statements back together at the time. However given the content of the debate I would ask the Hon Dr Michael Cullen to address that question. 
Rodney Hide 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I could rephrase it and help the Prime Minister. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: No that is fine. I think that the Minister can remember what the member said. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Prime Minister stated that the allegation that Mr Cosgrove had called her home on a number of occasions in the middle of the night was completely incorrect. Mr Cosgrove denied that. Those are the facts. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Does the Prime Minister think that the silence of Joris de Bres the Race Relations Commissioner on John Tamihere’s derogatory comments about Jews and the silence of Ros Noonan the Chief Human Rights Commissioner on John Tamihere’s derogatory comments about women confirm John Tamihere’s allegation that the ninth floor has apparatus activities and influence in everything related to the Government and that those two commissioners are silent because the Prime Minister wants them to be? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: No. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Given that her comments in the  
National Business Review  
are totally at variance with her recent comments on mystery phone calls from Mr Clayton Cosgrove which of these statements is true: the recent one or the one she gave back in 1993? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: As I said Mr Tamihere claimed that Mr Cosgrove had phoned the then Leader of the Opposition—in fact she was not the then Leader of the Opposition; it was before she was even leader of the Labour Party when she was the deputy leader of the Opposition—and her husband at night. The Prime Minister stated that in fact that was not the case and Mr Cosgrove said that that was not the case.