corruption

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Worth mired in corruption again

Written By: - Date published: 7:34 pm, April 16th, 2009 - 36 comments

(click the picture for the video) Why would Worth visit the Sandhu family to whom he was a stranger and who had nothing to do with his portfolio? What did he say to them? Why would he introduce himself as the Minister of Internal Affairs to the family? And why would he lie about that to the media? […]

Nats still involved in dodgy donations

Written By: - Date published: 8:30 am, April 16th, 2009 - 38 comments

The Herald covers some of the donations to parties and candidates before the election. One of the big donors was the Road Transport Forum, the trucking lobby, who were behind the famous ‘truck strike’. They’re getting value for money eh? National’s Transport Minister Steven Joyce has taken half a billion out of public transport and […]

Higher education

Written By: - Date published: 4:40 pm, April 7th, 2009 - 32 comments

Turns out Richard Worth’s not the only one with a passion for flying. Tertiary Education Minister Anne Tolley has been joyriding in helicopters at the taxpayers’ expense.

How much is a lie worth?

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 pm, April 2nd, 2009 - 29 comments

Labour revealed in parliament today that Richard Worth has another secret shareholding that created conflict of interest when he carried out ministerial duties on his trip to India. After Key gave him the famous ‘bollocking’ on Monday, Worth can have been under no illusion that there wasn’t a conflict of interest with these shares. He had repeated opportunities […]

Mayday Mayday, Worth’s bought it and I’m losing altitude – Groser out

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, April 1st, 2009 - 36 comments

Richard Worth, OBE, is now in very serious trouble having been snared in what looks like untruths about using his Ministerial portfolio to further the interests of a company he had a private commercial interest in. It’s pretty blatant and really Key won’t be able to get away with keeping him on for much longer. […]

What’s Labour got up its sleeve?

Written By: - Date published: 4:09 am, April 1st, 2009 - 20 comments

When you were perusing yesterday’s Hansard  (don’t lie, you were) did you notice this question from Pete Hodgson to Richard Worth amongst the questions about his India shenanigans? Hon Pete Hodgson: Does the Minister still receive any form of income from Simpson Grierson; if not, when did he last receive any income from Simpson Grierson? […]

Sean Plunket, “interviewer”

Written By: - Date published: 11:44 am, March 31st, 2009 - 19 comments

I’ve just listened to Sean Plunket interview Goff this morning. It was actually less of an interview and more an exercise in running cover for Richard Worth. And of course it’s not the first time Plunket has gone feral when National has been in trouble. A couple of weeks ago, he was demanding Labour produce […]

Worth’s story unravels

Written By: - Date published: 3:54 am, March 31st, 2009 - 57 comments

Despite getting a “bollocking” from John Key, Richard Worth last night denied that he had been acting as a minister when he went around India promoting flight training provided by a company he had shares in. Unfortunately for Worth, they have the internet in India too: Indian Express 28 Feb 2009 ‘My personal commitment to […]

“Corrupt!”

Written By: - Date published: 4:19 pm, March 30th, 2009 - 62 comments

National rode to power off the back of years of rhetoric accusing the last Labour government of corruption. Who can forget the screams from the Nats? – “Corrupt! Corrupt! Corrupt!” they cried. The boys in blue were going to deliver us a new era of transparency and accountable government. Interesting then to see a report […]

Sensible Sentencing Trust and GEO Group, a deafening silence

Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, March 11th, 2009 - 33 comments

Yesterday Tane did an excellent post speculating on links between the Sensible Sentencing Trust and GEO Group. GEO Group derived from the notorious Wackenhut Corrections and it now wants to run privately run and publically funded prisons in NZ. In the US, the GEO Group supports organizations preaching almost exactly the messages as the SST […]

Private prisons and the ‘tough on crime’ lobby

Written By: - Date published: 10:25 am, March 10th, 2009 - 31 comments

One of the features of a privatised prison system is the potential for corruption of the political process by the commercial interests of private prison operators. Thanks to Tom in the comments it’s come to light that GEO Group, the company formerly known as Wackenhut and main contendor for National’s privatised prisons, has funded ‘tough […]

Left to the market

Written By: - Date published: 2:10 pm, February 12th, 2009 - 34 comments

Two Pennsylvania Judges have been accused of taking bribes from private prison operators to ensure a reliable stream of prisoners. To quote Associated Press: In one of the most shocking cases of courtroom graft on record, two Pennsylvania judges have been charged with taking millions of dollars in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately […]

Pork barrelling from the Nats

Written By: - Date published: 9:26 am, November 5th, 2008 - 26 comments

One of the virtues of New Zealand government has long been that we avoid US-style pork barrel politics. The Government sets the direction of policy and priorities but doesn’t interfere with specific projects. The principle is that the experts, not the elected officials, should decide the details of specific projects. For instance, the Government might […]

Dunne’s deal?

Written By: - Date published: 9:58 am, November 3rd, 2008 - 37 comments

The revelations in today’s Dompost that Peter Dunne’s United party took a donation from the Vela family shows again what a messy business donations can be. The Vela family opposed New Zealand following a new UN fishing agreement. Ross Meurant, acting for the Velas met with Dunne, days later he issued a press release opposing […]

The H-fee explained

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 pm, October 29th, 2008 - 161 comments

A little more detail to flesh out Tane’s post. The core of the H-fee story is this: In 1987, head of Equiticorp Allan Hawkins illegally helped Elders Merchant Finance in New Zealand with the takeover of another company. In return, Elders paid Hawkins $66m through a series of sham foreign exchange transactions. There were two so-called […]

Update on Brownlee

Written By: - Date published: 5:20 pm, October 28th, 2008 - 37 comments

There are substantive policy issues such as National’s privatisation plans for the prisons that need to be covered but, first, an update on Gerry Brownlee’s conflict of interest. According to the NZPA: Brownlee said his shareholding (496 shares, worth around $4,000 during 2002-2003) was too small to amount to a pecuniary interest. – Pecuniary interest is […]

Standard scoop: Another senior Nat failed to disclose conflicts

Written By: - Date published: 10:39 am, October 28th, 2008 - 34 comments

Last month, Key lied when he was asked whether he had more Tranzrail shares, over which he had failed to declare his conflict of interest. On Sunday, it was revealed on The Standard that Key had also held shares in Fletcher Challenge Forests, which was campaigning for the Government to buy the rails off Tranzrail, […]

Key – Undisclosed conflict of interest

Written By: - Date published: 1:40 pm, October 27th, 2008 - 31 comments

National’s response to my revelation on The Standard that John Key owned shares had undisclosed conflicts of interest with Fletcher Challenge Forests is to deny the conflict. Let me restate the core conflict suscinctly: John Key owned shares in Fletcher Challenge Forests. Fletcher Challenge Forests was a major user of Tranzrail, it depended on Tranzrail […]

Standard Scoop: Key exposed again on secret shares and Tranzrail

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 pm, October 26th, 2008 - 145 comments

When the Tranzrail shares came to light, Key was asked whether he had any other undisclosed shares entailing a conflict of interest. He said he didn’t. That was not true. National Party Leader John Key failed to disclose his conflict of interest arising from his share holding in Fletcher Challenge Forests while using his privileges […]

Diversion tactics

Written By: - Date published: 1:28 pm, September 24th, 2008 - 87 comments

Key’s three defences on the share scandal are ‘no-one asked how many shares I had’, ‘it didn’t matter how many shares I had’, and ‘Labour is spending all their time researching me’. It’s classic distraction stuff. Let’s break it down. ‘No-one asked me how many shares I had’ – Yes, Fran Mold did on Monday […]

Did you pay the tax, John?

Written By: - Date published: 6:38 am, September 24th, 2008 - 34 comments

Generally, when you buy capital and later sell it, there is no tax payable on any profit. Unless you buy with the propose of selling the capital for a profit. That being the case, your buying and selling of the capital is engaging in an activity to generate income and tax is payable. It is […]

John’s lying eyes

Written By: - Date published: 4:35 pm, September 23rd, 2008 - 18 comments

All it takes is Youtube, some video editing software, and imagination to make great vids, as this video we have just been sent from ‘johnnyfivestrive’ shows:

Damned by his own words

Written By: - Date published: 2:40 pm, September 23rd, 2008 - 53 comments

Michael Cullen’s office has just released a damning exchange between John Key and Richard Prebble that shows John Key not only fully understood the requirement for him to disclose potential conflicts of interests such as his shareholding in Tranzrail, but even used ownership of Tranzrail shares as a hypothetical example of the need to disclose […]

One News footage

Written By: - Date published: 11:58 am, September 23rd, 2008 - 51 comments

For those who missed it, here’s the video from last night’s One News investigation into John Key’s TranzRail dealings. The first clip details Key’s abuse of his positition as an MP for personal financial gain, and the second clip has him lying about his shareholding, then quickly correcting himself when he realises he’s been busted.

Can he look himself in the mirror?

Written By: - Date published: 9:30 am, September 23rd, 2008 - 28 comments

John Key on August 30 “The appointment of a minister to Cabinet has to be done on the basis that as Prime Minister I can look that person in the eye and have confidence that I can rely on their word.” Also, I know it’s small change to Key but to those of us who aren’t […]

Hand in the till

Written By: - Date published: 6:51 pm, September 22nd, 2008 - 189 comments

One News has just run the revelation that John Key lied to the public and to Parliament about the extent of his shareholding in Tranzrail while using his position to ask questions about the Government’s intentions for rail. More importantly, it seems he met with Rail America in his capacity as National’s transport spokesperson to […]