Donnelly Brian: Urgent Debates — Release of Report—Telecommunications Stocktake Review 
Donnelly Brian: Urgent Debates — Release of Report—Telecommunications Stocktake Review 
[Volume:631;Page:3133] 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (NZ First) 
: 
 It appears in this particular case that the Opposition doth protest too much. One of the points that Opposition members have been making is that because of this leak $1.8 billion was wiped off Telecom’s share value. In fact the $1.8 billion would have been wiped off the moment that Dr Cullen announced on Thursday exactly the same Government policy. All that shows is that Telecom is overvalued by $1.8 billion. The question has to be asked as to why it is overvalued by $1.8 billion. It is because Telecom is—or has been up until this point in time—a monopoly. 
The real scandal in this whole saga surrounds in fact a certain Roderick Deane who was one of the architects of the so-called market economy which was to go through not only business but also State services and State delivery of services. That architect took over a State monopoly and turned it into a private monopoly and then that particular company behaved in a way purely and simply so as to retain its monopoly. The whole raison d’?tre of Telecom was to retain its monopoly. Someone described Telecom as a legal company with a telecommunications company attached to it. On the way Mr Deane picked up $2 million a year and received bonus shares etc. 
Let us have a look at the series of events because it is quite clear from the report that this leak came about as a result of misplaced friendship. I think we need to go through the series of events. Mr Ryan has admitted to the fact that he was carrying out his duties as a messenger with the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. On Monday 1 May his role involved assisting in the Cabinet Office with the distribution of the necessary mail and papers and he happened to see an agenda which was either for the Cabinet meeting that day or for the policy committee meeting to be held on Wednesday. He noticed that on the agenda was a consideration of the telecommunications review. 
Obviously as the report shows that evening after Mr Ryan went back home he happened to go to his friend’s place to look at some carpet. His friend was not there when he first arrived. Mr Garty came later and Mr Ryan happened to mention to Mr Garty that he had seen that item on the agenda. The very next day Mr Ryan once again undertaking his normal duties was making deliveries of documentation. One of those duties included removing confidential documents intended for shredding from trays designated for that purpose. 
We want to follow through the course of events from here. Mr Ryan saw the telecommunications stocktake document in a tray in an office shared by three policy advisory group advisers on the eighth floor of the Beehive. He took the document to the messengers’ room. I think we need to reflect on this. In the messengers’ room is the shredder. In the very room where the messengers keep their bags there is also the shredder. The report does recommend that we need to look at the systems. We certainly would ask whether it makes any sense to put the shredder in the room where the messengers have all their bags and their gear. In this particular case of course Mr Ryan put the document into his bag and took it home and later that evening gave it to Mr Garty. 
 The report states: “The employee”—that is Mr Garty—“and ultimately Telecom were passive recipients of the document having taken no action to seek it or to encourage Mr Ryan to provide it.” That is true. Mr Garty made photocopies of the document at his own home then delivered the document back to Mr Ryan the next day so that it could be brought back into the Beehive. One might ask whether Mr Garty’s behaviour at that particular stage met the integrity test. In this particular case the report made the comment—I think accurately—that from the moment Mr Garty saw the document he was in fact compromised. The photocopying could be justified in the sense that he immediately took it to Telecom’s legal advisers and said: “Listen this is what I’ve been shown. What do you make of it?”. In fairness to Telecom it immediately made contact with Mr Cunliffe’s office and said—[ 
Interruption 
] I am actually saying in fairness to Telecom that it immediately made contact with the executive said it had the papers and asked what it was supposed to do about them. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: And what did they say? 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY 
: The executive probably said: “We’ve got some urgent messages. We’d better run across and see Winston Peters because we’ve got to make this announcement some time today.” 
I want to make a personal comment. As telecommunications spokesperson for New Zealand First I was rung the next day by someone who asked given that the confidence and supply agreement states everything should be shared whether we had seen the paper. Thank God I was able to say that I had never seen sight nor sign of that particular paper so it was not me who had leaked it. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: It was posted on the Internet that day. 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY 
: I did not get it until the next day—I did not have it. 
As I said the report recommends that some of the systems need to be looked at. One of the things that has not yet been spoken about is that during the whole review process people tried to gather up all the copies of that particular document. It is noted in the report: “on 11 May 2006 I was advised that a further copy of this paper had been located behind a photocopier located in Hon. Mr Cunliffe’s office.” The report goes on to state: “It is clear to me that this additional copy found fell behind the photocopier by accident during the rush to provide the media with copies on that date.”—on 3 May. But that remark raises some very serious questions about the security of vital documents if they can fall behind photocopiers in such a manner in a Minister’s office. Certainly there are some disturbing features of this particular matter and lessons have to be learnt from it. There is no doubt that it was a very serious leak and a very serious security breach. However I believe that the report has got it accurately—the leak stemmed from misplaced loyalty rather than from any criminal intent to try to beat the stock market. 
In terms of some of the other systems the report goes into for example the employment processes that are carried out by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Certainly there is absolutely thorough scrutiny of the employees there and that includes a psychological report. So that particular area is certainly tied up as are the requirements under employment law etc. to make sure employees’ contracts include the requirements to maintain the confidentiality of all the documents they see. As the report states at that level there is certainly robustness. Some systematic problems need to be looked at in order to ensure that there are not repeats of this particular leak. Everyone would recognise that the situation is very very serious but it is wrong to protest and say it demonstrates serious malfunctioning on the eighth and ninth floors; the report shows that the problem was one of misplaced friendship involving a person who had passed all the tests and jumped all the hurdles to get a job as a messenger in that particular department. In fact in this case the person himself knows he made an extremely foolish mistake by taking the action he did.