Written By: - Date published: 9:28 am, May 6th, 2011 - 28 comments
Judith Collins has joined the long list of National MPs with their hands buried up to the elbows in the taxpayer’s pockets. She claims it was all within the rules. That doesn’t make it right.
Written By: - Date published: 8:31 pm, November 15th, 2010 - 98 comments
We learn from rort-buster Pete Hodgson that Pansy Wong and her husband have been running private companies out of her taxpayer-funded electorate office. I don’t see how she can remain in Parliament now. Who set and enforced the standards that have seen so many ministers involved in rorts? There’s only one person to point the finger at: Key
Written By: - Date published: 12:22 am, November 4th, 2010 - 48 comments
Weren’t Bill ‘Double Dipton’ English and other ministers caught rorting the housing allowance system last year? Didn’t the Government revamp the system by giving ministers capped allowances, supposedly to save money and stop rorts? Why then are we, as I predicted, paying more than ever while ministers blatantly rip us off?
Written By: - Date published: 9:25 am, May 5th, 2010 - 26 comments
You’ll remember how Bill ‘Double Dipton’ English was caught claiming the out of town allowance for living in his family home in Wellington. As a half-arsed solution, out of town ministers are now limited to claiming $37,500 a year for their Wellington accommodation. So, how come eight ministers are still claiming far more than that?
Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, November 3rd, 2009 - 21 comments
Yesterday, John Key cleverly tried to reframe his ministers’ failure to obey his standards on use of perks: “You don’t want 120 Members of Parliament who have the financial independence to be able to make the financial decisions that I make. “It wouldn’t be the House of Representatives, we need people from all walks of […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:45 am, October 30th, 2009 - 9 comments
Bill English claims (echoes of another Bill!) that he did not have pecuniary relations with his family trust: “I didn’t have a pecuniary interest in the trust, I never have had, I don’t now and I don’t have any other interests in it.” According to both common sense and the Auditor General he was wrong […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, October 29th, 2009 - 30 comments
Bill English stands condemned. Only in part by the Auditor General. Her report is ambiguous: The result was that the Crown was renting a property for Mr English from a trust in which he had an interest, and the arrangement was explicitly based on a view that he did not have an interest. Clearly, this […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, October 27th, 2009 - 4 comments
Bill English knows a thing or two about screwing every possible cent out of the system. He gets his generous $276,000 salary. For years he received his unjustified Wellington accommodation allowance. The rules were changed so he could get an even bigger Wellington allowance as a Minister, but he got caught out and grudgingly paid […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:29 am, October 5th, 2009 - 20 comments
Greetings to the good people of Dipton. Must be fun to be so much in the news lately! I hope some local entrepreneurs are working out how to make good on all the free publicity. I’d expect Dipton’s high profile in the media to last a bit longer, as Bill English continues his belated attempts […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:39 am, October 2nd, 2009 - 78 comments
That last post was probably a bit dull for a Friday morning, so now for something completely different. I was a little surprised last night to see on Scoop the following worthy publication: Plain English – No. 2, 2009 Welcome to Plain English, my regular newsletter aimed at Clutha-Southland residents. It covers local issues as […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:37 am, October 2nd, 2009 - 11 comments
Bill English keeps claiming that he has “no pecuniary interest” in his family trust. What does that mean? A while back John A did a post on pecuniary interest. Time for Part 2 in the series. As John A noted, the main case which seems to be cited in defining pecuniary interest (at least in […]
Written By: - Date published: 3:20 pm, October 1st, 2009 - 95 comments
I have to disagree with my comrade Zetetic’s post arguing that it’s best if Bill English stays in office. Yes, this scandal has permanently destroyed English’s credibility and I can see how having a lame duck Deputy PM and Finance Minister plays into the Left’s hands. But I do think our touchstone should always be […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:34 am, September 30th, 2009 - 33 comments
Bill English is teetering on the edge. National spinners are claiming that he has done what is needed to “close the issue down”. Labour are going to keep pushing. National’s next step will be to run a “poor Bill” defence. “Poor Bill has paid it back, what more can he do?”, “Poor Bill was just […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:48 am, September 28th, 2009 - 66 comments
There’s an old lawyer joke: “When the facts are on your side, bang the facts. When the law’s on your side, bang the law. When you’ve got neither, bang the table”. National have a similar tactic, of banging on legal vs. moral tests as it suits them. When sacking Richard Worth, Key was at great […]
Written By: - Date published: 5:30 pm, September 27th, 2009 - 19 comments
Trev on the money laundering bill. Has a go at a certain Bill who has been laundering a lot of our money. Very good:
Written By: - Date published: 8:04 am, September 27th, 2009 - 4 comments
Things must be getting decidedly trippy for Deputy PM Bill English about now, and not in a good way. While his glorious leader is off overseas playing the Jester Statesman, back home Bill’s future is looking gloomier by the day. With the Auditor General looking into English‘s Krishna-like claims of being able to exist in […]
Written By: - Date published: 2:19 pm, September 26th, 2009 - 5 comments
John Armstrong joins the list of commentators saying Bill English shouldn’t get a cent for his housing rort: The time has come for Bill “Double Dipton” English to end the charade. Now, being Armstrong, the reasons aren’t principled, it’s all about limiting the damage to National: The possibility of the watchdog of public spending investigating the Minister […]
Written By: - Date published: 10:16 am, September 23rd, 2009 - 10 comments
In an extraordinary coincidence, the Attorney-General in the UK is about to lose her job for pretty much the same rort as Bill English has been pulling here: [Baroness Scotland] receives a £38,280-a-year “night subsistence allowance” widely understood to be for ministers whose primary home is outside London even though she owns a large house […]
Written By: - Date published: 6:30 am, September 23rd, 2009 - 39 comments
Our readers pointed out some interesting quotes in yesterday’s thread on Bill English’s attempt to bully journalists into silence over his housing allowance rort. Key on why he fired Richard Worth: “The test of whether someone enjoys my confidence is not a legal test and I have never argued that Dr Worth broke any legal test.’ […]
Written By: - Date published: 5:12 am, September 17th, 2009 - 29 comments
Pete Hodgson is continuing to chip away at English’s ministerial allowance story. English looks very uncomfortable as Brownlee and Key cover for him. To my mind, this is yesterday’s crucial exchange: Hon Pete Hodgson: If the Hon Bill English has no pecuniary interest in his ministerial residence, then how come the email I have here, dated […]
Written By: - Date published: 5:54 am, September 9th, 2009 - 13 comments
As I alluded to yesterday, the claims from John Key that he has slashed hundreds of thousands of dollars from the cost of ministerial housing are rubbish. The media did a pretty good job of exposing the lie (except TV3 who just had some junior reporter toeing Key’s line). Here’s how it works. Ministerial services […]
Written By: - Date published: 10:00 am, September 8th, 2009 - 48 comments
And by any other name it smells as bad. John Key has annouced a reform of the rules for ministerial accommodation allowance. A fixed, automatic allowance will now be paid to all out of Wellington ministers of $37,500 a year for their Wellington accomodation (or $30,000 if they own the house), slightly less than the highest spending ministers […]
Written By: - Date published: 5:41 am, August 10th, 2009 - 22 comments
Following the success of TV3’s ‘Big Night In’ Telethon which raised over $2 million for KidsCan, I was thinking there are others that could benefit from some charity. You know, the recession is biting and even people who have been used to living well are now having to couple with dramatic cuts to their incomes. […]
Written By: - Date published: 3:00 pm, August 6th, 2009 - 72 comments
So there I was, just a walking down the street, and $47,000 just fell out of the sky in tax free readies, bam, right in to my lap! Like I was Bill English or something! What – that never happened to you? Me neither. We have to work for our money. Actually I guess Bill […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:57 pm, August 6th, 2009 - 9 comments
Shh. Hear that sound? It’s National’s mud throwing machine gearing up again. Inevitably, they’ve released Labour’s ministers’ spending. No evidence of any rort but the big numbers work into the media narrative. It’s all about taking the focus off ministers ripping us off by taking allowances they shouldn’t and making it ‘gosh, everyone spends lots huh?’. […]
Written By: - Date published: 8:48 am, August 6th, 2009 - 26 comments
English, now known by the moniker Double Dipton, has decided to give back half the amount to has rorted so far from the taxpayer. Rather than claim the full ministers’ allowance, he’ll pocket ‘only’ $24,000 a year for living in his own family home, thank you very much. His claim that he didn’t know he could charge […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, August 5th, 2009 - 46 comments
Are you? a disgraced former minister who resigned from Parliament in shame? a National MP who rents from a National minister (Judith Collins or Anne Tolley for example), claiming that expense back from the taxpayer while the minister simultaneously rents another place, again on the taxpayer’s tab? a private citizen who dares to publicly oppose […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:20 am, August 5th, 2009 - 26 comments
Key admits his ministers are rorting the system – exploiting the allowance not for need but just because it gives them a chance for a bit of free cash: “In some instances you’ve got ministers moving out of homes where they might otherwise stay there but the rules don’t really encourage that” So, they’re moving […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, August 5th, 2009 - 35 comments
What would you call it when you collect $900 a week by false pretenses? What would you call it when you tell the Electoral Commission and Ministerial Services that you live somewhere other than where you, your partner and your children actually live and work? And if you did those things while holding an office presumably subject […]
Written By: - Date published: 7:44 am, August 4th, 2009 - 48 comments
One of these things is not like the other One of these things is not quite the same. Can you guess which one is not like the other Can you tell me before I finish the game?
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