Prebble Richard: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
Prebble Richard: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
[Volume:611;Page:8251] 
1.  
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT NZ) 
 to the  
Chairperson of the Local Government and Environment Committee 
: Will the chairperson be requesting the Prime Minister to attend a meeting of the committee in relation to the inquiry into “corngate”; if so when? 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Chairperson of the Local Government and Environment Committee): 
 The committee considered a motion to that effect last week and it was not agreed to. As far as I am concerned that is the end of the matter. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: How can the committee credibly carry out its own terms of reference—in particular whether a contamination tolerance level was accepted by the Government in 2000—in light of the memorandum to the Prime Minister by Ruth Wilkie on 8 December 2000 headed “Possible contamination of imported seed with genetically modified material” and stating: “We cannot say whether we have reliably discovered contamination in the corn currently planted but equally we cannot say that we have completely discounted it” and the Prime Minister’s statement on 11 July the eve of the election— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member will be seated. The member knows full well that the chairperson is responsible for her actions as chairperson. She is not responsible for voting decisions by individual members of the committee and the question relates to that. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. A committee has set up an inquiry to publicly investigate this matter and I think I am entitled to ask the committee—not the chairperson—how it believes it can discover whether there has been a cover-up and whether the Prime Minister’s statement on the eve of the election that “I can state categorically that the tests confirm that there was no evidence that there was GE contamination.” was true or whether it was a complete cover-up by the Government. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I refer the member to Speaker’s ruling 22/1 (Supplement). He knows full well that it is the chairperson alone not the committee who can be asked about her actions as chair. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. If you are going to put it that way I ask the chairperson why she regards the matter as ending at this point given the fact that the Prime Minister made a public statement categorically denying that there was any GE contamination which was in contradiction to statements given to her by her own officials. 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS 
: I believe the committee has ample written evidence in front of it to reach a conclusion eventually about whether a threshold was set. We are seeking additional scientific interpretation of test results to help us with the question of just what those results showed in terms of likely contamination. Those are important terms of reference for the committee and I believe we can answer them with the information we have. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Is it true that the chairperson was threatened by Labour that if she voted for my motion in favour of the Prime Minister coming before the committee there would be adverse consequences for the Green Party in any future coalition? 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS 
: No.