I was impressed with National’s uber confidence yesterday. Sure they might have had a week from hell and a poll result confirming that they were no longer the biggest party and their support was waning and they had no friends but their line that it could have been a lot worse resonated somewhat.
After all it was not as if their leader had been implicated in doing anything illegal.
Parties partition up donations all the time and split $100k donations into seven $14k donations and one $2 donation for the Feng Shui, not so that the identity of the donor has to be disclosed. After all it is not as if they were embarrassed that their giving an award to this person would not look good, or that the fact that an associate of this person wanting to be a National Party MP might be frowned on.
And the confident expressions that all was fine by independent commentators who used to be National Party General Secretaries was notable. After all they should know.
And the Electoral Law does not have provisions relating to donations funded by contributions. National’s Party Secretary was not obliged to give the donation back. He did not have reasonable grounds to believe that the donor has failed to comply with his obligation to advise that the donation had come from contributions. He was under no obligation to disclose the fact the donation came from contributions. And it is not an offence to file a false return.
And what about Simon Bridges in his own return mistakenly calling Aaron Bhatnagar “Cathedral Club”? This was an innocent mistake that happens all the time.
Of course the Police seeking advice from the Electoral Commission will result in no action being taken.
There is nothing to see here.
One can be assured by the fact that National is not panicking. Simon Bridges ringing Cameron Slater is absolutely fine. Slater having a key role to play in this matter as it develops is nothing for National to worry about. What could go wrong?
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