I think lprent justifies John Keys so called tardy disclosure in this comment;

lprent: August 28, 2008 at 12:52 pm

burt: You are just being silly. Looked at the statement and nothing changes.

She asked Peters if it was true, and he said no. You take the word of ministers.

Tell me, do you expect PM’s to have a touch of the divine and to be able to see inside peoples heads?

Reading what the response was to gives it context. Non disclosure over a period of months and months compared to a few weeks.

Take the ministers word and do nothing was acceptable for Labour eh, but not National.

I saw Key on Close Up. Apparently Goff came to him on the quiet about a month ago stating the women had some concerns and asked Key to do something about it.

Key talked to Worth who denied any wrong-doing whatsoever and was prepared to sign an affidavit to that effect. Keys people went back to Goffs people with this report. According to Key it was a case of He said she said with no evidence either way.

According to Key, Goff has had over a month to come up with the texts etc to prove the womens case. He has not done this even until today. According to Key if had seen the evidence, Worth would have been a gone-burger.

Woman: private citizen, from conservative Asian culture, respectful of authority, perhaps a migrant (not known), young.

Man: government Minister, voice of authority, power to grant favours, make threats, exploit her status and his.

You think this was a relationship betwen equals? Get real.

“You wanna call the police? Hell, lady, I am the police.”

Calls and txts actually. Nothing said about e-mails.

I think it was 40 calls and 60 texts or vice-versa since November.

I wonder how many calls and texts went the other way from her. It is just inconceivable she would have put up with this barrage for soooo long unless she was a willing participant. What did her husband think and do about all this? Afterall, according to Goff she was happily married.

I can imagine the conversation:

Husband: Who was that dear?
Wife: Just Richard Worth again.
Husband: What did he want this time.
Wife: Just wants me to do a bit of skinnydipping with him.

If this was truly harrasment over this length of time, then why on earth didn’t she or her husband do something about it? Surely the only conclusion can be that she was a willing participant or was trying to set him up.

One possibility is that she and Worth were forming a romantic relationship and her husband found out. So now she is getting all self-righteous and trying to drop Worth in it to preserve her marriage.

Statement tabled in Parliament – thwack!

Worth says he won’t go quietly – thwack!

Time to Supersize the popcorn …

But hang on… Even if it can not be proved that Worth was offering a job for ‘romantic’ favours. Does that really matter? The fact he was allegedly offering job’s outside of the normal procurement process is an issue is it not?

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10576462

So, if Worth did deny that emails existed, should Key have asked Goff to front with them? I think he should have, rather than just telling Goff that there is nothing to the claims.

Daveski. Winnie was a coalition partner and the leader of NZFirst. Worth is a National MP, on his second or third last chance. Not the same circumstances. And yet I seem to recall that even then, Key Hide and others were saying that Clark had obligations to not take him at his word but to actively investigate. Did Key live up to that standard? Seeing you brought it up.

how soon was “soon” – less than a week?

And it took Clark a full year to decide the Field was uinfit to be an MP. About a week for Key.

But I take it you agree then about Samuels.

By the way, for the intellectually challenged, this isn’t an attack on Clark, merely pointing out that like it or not PMs have to consider due process and natural justice – which always means taking more time. And they do have to consider how to manage thomgs politically. They are in politics afterall.

And did National act like Labour is now – yes of course.

But it is hilarious watching you guys baying for blood. You really don’t see the contradiction do you.

Goff’s undoubtedly deserves some credit for his original actions but since that this has descended into petty political posturing (which I have to say is some of my best alliteration yet!)