                 12.04.2000 - 

                 WELLINGTON - More money will be allocated for prison
                 programmes targeting Maori offenders, says Corrections
                 Minister Matt Robson. 

                 He also said yesterday he was "pushing hard" in
                 Budget discussions for increased funding for victims,
                 and hinted at new initiatives geared towards victims'
                 emotional and financial needs. 

                 In a speech to the regional prison managers' meeting at
                 Hawkes Bay Regional Prison in Hastings, Mr Robson
                 said New Zealand had the second-highest rate of
                 imprisonment in the Western world and Maori were
                 disproportionately represented. 

                 Maori made up 15 per cent of the population but about
                 44 per cent of the jail population. 

                 Thirty-eight per cent returned to prison within a year of
                 being released. 

                 Mr Robson said the best solution to the problem would
                 come from Maori. His job was to "hustle" for resources
                 to fund Maori-run programmes in jails. 

                 The secret to programmes such as Mahi Tahi, involving
                 teams of Maori working with Maori inmates, and other
                 initiatives such as the bicultural therapy model - having
                 Maori leaders alongside prison psychologists - was that
                 offenders realised for the first time "that their crimes are
                 against their own lore, not just the law of the land." 

                 Department of Corrections research indicated Maori
                 offenders were less likely than Pakeha to seek
                 psychological help, and when they did see prison
                 psychologists - who were often Pakeha - they would
                 use culture to refuse to face up to their offending. 

                 "Working alongside Maori service providers has started
                 to break down those blocks," said Mr Robson. 

                 Representatives from 13 countries are attending the
                 five-day meeting.

Discussion runs out of puff only after
                 all-nighter

                 11.05.2000 - By EUGENE BINGHAM 

                 Depending on your view, it was either the first flicker of
                 the new day or the fag end of the old one when Speaker
                 Jonathan Hunt ended the torture yesterday. 

                 "This House stands adjourned until 2 pm tomorrow ...
                 ah, today." 

                 At 5.16 am, it was an understandable slip. 

                 MPs had endured their most gruelling debate in more
                 than five years, a marathon session to push through a
                 law increasing the price on cigarettes. They began
                 about 5 pm on Tuesday and argued all through the
                 night, breaking only once for dinner and ending shortly
                 before breakfast yesterday. 

                 So what was going on until that time in the morning? 

                 Midnight: The House is tied down with argument over
                 two National amendments trying to force the
                 Government to spend the new revenue on health
                 programmes. 

                 To block them, the Government files two certificates of
                 veto signed by the Minister of Defence, Mark Burton.
                 Unfortunately, an official has assigned Mr Burton a new
                 ministry - defense (the US spelling). 

                 1.05 am: Mr Hunt is called upon to rule whether the
                 certificates are legitimate. He says they are, despite the
                 spelling mistake. 

                 1.20 am: Deputy Speaker Geoff Braybrooke tries to
                 bring order to the House and in doing so issues a
                 tempting offer. 

                 "We are going to have some order in this place and we
                 are not going to have any filibustering. Anybody who
                 argues will go for an early shower - I realise some
                 people will put their hands up." 

                 1.35 am: Mr Braybrooke tells the House it has wasted
                 about 90 minutes debating the National amendments
                 because he has just received advice the motions were
                 out of order. Inevitably, 10 more minutes are wasted
                 through debate about whether the debate should
                 continue. 

                 1.45 am: Revelation - Auckland Airport has the lowest
                 priced cigarettes in the Pacific Rim, says Act leader
                 Richard Prebble. 

                 He believes a measure in the new law restricting to one
                 the number of cartons of cigarettes that one person can
                 buy duty free will harm tourism. 

                 Finance Minister Michael Cullen is sceptical, doubting
                 the Tourism Board has ever run advertisements saying:
                 "Clean, green New Zealand. Come puff to your heart's
                 content." 

                 1.55 am: National whip John Carter says food was
                 always available for MPs when the House used to sit all
                 night. 

                 "Those days are long gone," says Mr Braybrooke. 

                 Act's Rodney Hide, meanwhile, is concerned about the
                 parliamentary staff who have had to stay on. Should
                 MPs do a whip around and buy them pizzas? No one
                 bites. 

                 2.55 am: Concern is spreading. Mr Carter is worried
                 about his mum. She's about to go off travelling and he
                 worries that if she gets a notice from the Government
                 telling her she is entitled to one carton of cigarettes
                 when she returns, she might get confused and think of it
                 as a state order to start smoking. 

                 "I don't want her to, at 76, because she will be cutting
                 into my inheritance." 

                 3.05 am: Mr Prebble finds a reference in the bill's small
                 print to "reconstituted tobacco." He wonders what it is -
                 stubbs from the gutter? 

                 3.20 am: Sniff, sniff. National's Murray McCully tries to
                 have snuff users excluded from the new tax. "I always
                 enjoyed the support of snuff users in my electorate and I
                 want to be able to look them in the eye and say I did
                 my best for them." 

                 3.55 am: Mr Hunt returns to the chair to preside over the
                 final stage of the debate. 

                 Government MPs, who - aside from Dr Cullen - have
                 remained silent all night, use their slots to say one or
                 two sentences, hurrying the process along. 

                 Opposition MPs, however, have other ideas and use
                 their full entitlement of 10 minutes. 

                 4.30 am: Taranaki-King Country MP Shane Ardern
                 reckons this is the perfect time for him to speak in
                 Parliament. 

                 "The valve radios in the milking sheds of King Country
                 and Taranaki will be coming on now." 

                 5.16 am: Relief for all - except smokers. The bill
                 passes, 65 votes to 54.


  11.05.2000 - By JOHN ARMSTRONG 

                 A red-faced Government was trying to soothe China last
                 night after Parliament committed a diplomatic blunder
                 by unanimously offering its "warmest congratulations" to
                 the new President of Taiwan. 

                 Acting Foreign Affairs Minister Jim Sutton admitted the
                 Coalition was caught napping by the motion from
                 United's Peter Dunne, which passed without dissent
                 because no one realised its potential for
                 embarrassment. 

                 New Zealand operates a strict "One China" policy and
                 does not recognise Taiwan as a separate nation. The
                 Chinese are highly sensitive to anything which might be
                 seen as contradicting that stance.



      'Easy exit' nudge for party boss

                 09.06.2000 - By VERNON SMALL deputy political
                 editor 

                 Prime Minister Helen Clark held a secret meeting with
                 controversial Labour Party president Bob Harvey
                 yesterday aimed at negotiating his dignified exit from
                 the race for another term as party boss. 

                 A spokesman for Helen Clark said that there would be
                 no comment on such an internal matter as Mr Harvey's
                 future. 

                 Mr Harvey, who is also mayor of Waitakere City and
                 chairman of the Auckland Mayoral Forum, insisted he
                 had yet to make a decision whether to stand again in
                 November. 

                 He expected to decide next month - "I am weighing it up
                 in my life." 

                 He said the time the presidency involved was a factor. "I
                 have to talk with my council in Waitakere [about]
                 whether I will stand again." 

                 No one had discussed with him whether he had the
                 numbers to win. "Nor have I run out and started to whip
                 up a bandwagon of enthusiasm. False alarm. There is
                 no story and nothing has changed." 

                 Mr Harvey's future is being questioned in the Beehive
                 after his recent attack on Finance Minister Michael
                 Cullen's style and inability to relate to Auckland
                 business people. 

                 He has also said Aucklanders do not care about, and
                 do not like, South Islanders. 

                 Said a Beehive source: "Bob Harvey's chances of
                 holding the presidency were never good and have
                 diminished to vanishing point." 

                 Insiders claim Dr Cullen was furious at the remarks, but
                 Mr Harvey said the finance minister had not called him
                 to discuss them. 

                 The party's Southland division is likely to seek an
                 apology from Mr Harvey at the regional conference. 

                 Labour general secretary Rob Allen said the party did
                 not release nominations until they had closed. He was
                 not aware that Mr Harvey was planning to step aside. 

                 Mr Harvey's main rival, former Labour campaign
                 manager Mike Williams, is a trusted Clark lieutenant
                 whom she has consulted over the recent crisis of
                 business confidence. 

                 He confirmed yesterday that he had been asked by
                 "little people" in the party if he would accept a
                 nomination for the presidency. He confirmed he would. 

                 Mr Williams had heard nothing about Mr Harvey's plans,
                 but assumed he was firming up his intention to stand. 

                 Mr Harvey has been dogged by incidents seen as
                 embarrassing to Labour, including a claim that the US
                 Central Intelligence Agency poisoned former Prime
                 Minister Norm Kirk, and an alleged down-trou during an
                 altercation with a Waitakere resident.


                 09.06.2000 - By AUDREY YOUNG political reporter 

                 The Government has apparently given the Greens
                 control over the spending of millions of budget dollars to
                 appease the party for a ministerial oversight. 

                 The move is understood to have caused considerable
                 resentment. 

                 The Herald understands the initiative, finalised only on
                 Wednesday last week, was to rectify an oversight by
                 Associate Finance Minister Trevor Mallard which saw
                 the Greens' Budget wish list lying neglected for weeks. 

                 The solution will see the Greens trumpet their own
                 initiatives in a package valued between $10 million and
                 $20 million in Thursday's Budget. 

                 The Greens' Budget proposals across a range of
                 portfolios were sent to Prime Minister Helen Clark
                 before Easter. 

                 It is understood Mr Mallard was delegated to consider
                 them all but mistakenly addressed only those in his
                 own education portfolio. 

                 The oversight was discovered when the Greens followed
                 up their package - but many of the key decisions had
                 already been made. 

                 Discussions continued over several weeks in an effort to
                 remedy the situation. 

                 On Wednesday last week, Finance Minister Michael
                 Cullen nominated a dollar limit - not surprisingly, it was
                 less than the initial bid - and the party was given the
                 freedom to order its own priorities in the form of a Green
                 package. 

                 Immediately after last November's general election, the
                 Green Party - with its seven MPs - pledged to support
                 the Labour-Alliance minority Government on confidence
                 measures such as the Budget. 

                 A rumour that it had threatened to vote against the
                 Budget unless some of its proposals were included was
                 denied last night by co-leader Rod Donald. 

                 "We've always indicated we would like to know what
                 was in the Budget before we supported it, but we were
                 never explicit about that. 

                 "In the last few months we have been more explicit as
                 ... we needed to see what the Budget was in key
                 portfolios so we knew that what we were promoting
                 wasn't already being covered. 

                 "It's a reasonable expectation that we see what we're
                 voting for. I don't see that there is an implied threat in
                 that. 

                 "We've been able to find out everything we need, which I
                 think is a mature way to work. In spite of what [Alliance
                 leader] Jim Anderton suggests, we haven't breathed a
                 peep of it." 

                 Mr Anderton questioned this week whether the Greens,
                 formerly of the Alliance, could be trusted with cabinet
                 documents. 

                 Mr Donald said the Greens had never "directly or
                 indirectly" threatened to vote against the Budget.


Turia told off - but holds on to her job 
 
04.09.2000 - By EUGENE BINGHAM political reporter 
A bristling Helen Clark warned radical minister Tariana Turia to drop the "psycho-babble" yesterday but stopped short of 
dumping her over the Maori holocaust speech. 
The Prime Minister returned from a mountain holiday and immediately let Mrs Turia know she had been offended by the 
now infamous speech in Hamilton last week. 
But she ended their telephone conversation in a conciliatory tone, resisting calls for Mrs Turia's sacking and instead 
setting her back on the path of the Government's Closing the Gaps programme. 
"She should stay to ground and concentrate on some practical work." 
Helen Clark also made a call to number four-ranked minister Steve Maharey, assigning him to keep a close watch on the 
fiery Associate Minister of Maori Affairs. 
Mrs Turia caused outrage last week when she said Maori tribes had suffered a "holocaust" under colonisation and said 
Maori violence was a result of "post-colonial traumatic stress disorder." 
Her speech to a psychologists' conference was made while the Prime Minister was away on a 10-day break. 
Upon her return yesterday, Helen Clark said she was offended by the holocaust reference. 
"I have made it clear that it is completely unacceptable analogy to me. "Okay, there are parts of New Zealand history that 
none of us can be proud of, but I'm afraid it's hard to find an equivalent to six million [Jewish] people being trucked and 
railed to gas chambers and exterminated." 
Asked how much damage the speech had done to the Government, Helen Clark revealed she had considered returning 
home early to deal with the fallout. 
"Obviously I thought about this as I was on half a cellphone battery with a crackly line out of a mountain hut. I thought, 
'Should I rush back?' 
"Then I thought, 'Well, it's a bit out of perspective to rush back for one ill-judged speech by a junior minister."' 
While the speech should not have been given, it did not warrant a sacking, said Helen Clark. 
"Mrs Turia, focused on a problem, can do a power of good and my job is to endeavour to focus her on the problem. 
"My job is to keep her focused on the problem - not the psycho-babble." 
Helen Clark also revealed that the speech replaced an original one written by the Ministry of Maori Development, Te Puni 
Kokiri. 
Mrs Turia told Helen Clark she had decided against delivering the ministry speech but had asked a staff member to show 
the new speech to the Prime Minister's office. 
"At that point, our systems would have got it and we would have said, 'Hang on a minute, you can't put it like that.' 
Unfortunately, the staff member let her down and let us all down." 
A spokeswoman for Mrs Turia said she was unavailable for comment yesterday. 
She did confirm that the speech replaced an original one provided by Te Puni Kokiri, but would not comment on why it 
was not shown to Helen Clark's staff. 
When asked who had written the speech, the spokeswoman said it was not written by one particular person. 
"It came out of the office as a whole." 


                 John Tamihere

                 Plenty more ammo for dirty tricks war

                 08.07.2000 - By AUDREY YOUNG and STAFF
                 REPORTERS 

                 Up to half the country's politicians have matters in their
                 pasts they fear will be made public, Labour MP John
                 Tamihere claims. 

                 Mr Tamihere, who admitted three drink-driving
                 convictions on Thursday, made his comments
                 yesterday shortly after National MP John Carter was
                 also forced to reveal a drink-driving conviction. 

                 Mr Carter was caught in 1985. Mr Tamihere notched up
                 three convictions between 1979 and 1993. Both
                 revelations follow sexual misconduct allegations last
                 month which cost Dover Samuels his Maori Affairs
                 portfolio. 

                 Mr Carter yesterday divulged details of his offence,
                 which he said scared him so much he gave up drinking
                 for a decade. 

                 He was found to have 500mcg of alcohol per litre of
                 breath - 100mcg above the present limit. 

                 In an interview with the Weekend Herald, Mr Tamihere
                 said he estimated about half the present MPs had
                 convictions or skeletons in their closets and were
                 worried. 

                 "Every person ... has something they regret in their
                 background. I've got to tell you that a number of those
                 parliamentarians down there are scared shitless about
                 where this thing's going. 

                 "Once you've hit a low standard and that's the mark, a
                 lot of people can hit it." 

                 Mr Tamihere said he knew colleagues with records but
                 would reveal who they were only if they were a minister
                 or spokesperson and their role conflicted with their past.

                 When asked about his three drink-driving convictions,
                 Mr Tamihere said he could remember little about them. 

                 The first in 1979 came after a university function, the
                 second after he graduated from Law School and the
                 third after his sober driver got drunk and collapsed in a
                 car park. 

                 Mr Tamihere, a former head of the Waipareira Trust,
                 which runs anti-drink-drive programmes, said he had not
                 driven while over the legal alcohol limit since his last
                 conviction because it would have set a bad example to
                 Maori. 

                 He said he had no other convictions. 

                 The first-term MP said he was concerned at the
                 muck-raking in Parliament and the spotlight being
                 placed on the lives and pasts of MPs. 

                 "Where's it going to end?" 

                 Prime Minister Helen Clark says she advised Mr
                 Tamihere to go public about forgery charges against him
                 because Act was trying to subvert the suppression
                 order on the 1995 case. 

                 The Prime Minister dismisses protests by Act leader
                 Richard Prebble that he was not behind the anonymous
                 fax which disclosed details of Mr Tamihere's
                 convictions. 

                 "It is just outrageously deceitful for him to put his
                 tongue in his cheek and say Act had no part of this,"
                 she told the Weekend Herald. 

                 "Act has been trying to elicit this information for months
                 to get us to put it on the record." 

                 Helen Clark said she was fully aware of Mr Tamihere's
                 "baggage" but he was a powerful advocate for urban
                 Maori. 

                 "We did a lot of checking on John before we allowed
                 him to come forward as a candidate and what
                 consistently came through was people said, 'Yes,
                 there's some baggage but this is a man who is direct
                 and up front and will deal with that in an open way'." 

                 Mr Tamihere made a statement to Parliament declaring
                 his drink-drive convictions and, breaching his own
                 suppression order under parliamentary privilege,
                 outlining the history to the forgery charge. 

                 It did not involve personal gain. As secretary of a trust
                 buying three kaumatua houses from the Housing
                 Corporation in 1990, he signed the names of two absent
                 trustees. The police prosecuted in 1995, and he was
                 discharged without conviction. 

                 Since March, Act leader Richard Prebble and MP
                 Rodney Hide have asked written parliamentary
                 questions apparently related to Mr Tamihere's 1995
                 case but without mentioning his name. 

                 Helen Clark says they were designed to subvert the
                 suppression order. 

                 Then a fax was sent anonymously to Radio New
                 Zealand on Thursday from a Grey Lynn chemist shop
                 referring to three drink-drive convictions over 14 years
                 and the forgery case. 

                 "My advice to John was 'If you don't deal with it now,
                 others will deal with it for you'." 

                 Mr Prebble said the questions had been "warning shots"
                 to Mr Tamihere for his personal attacks on Act. 

                 "We were trying to draw to the attention of the Labour
                 Party that it should get out of the utter."


                 Prebble obvious target for Labour mud
                 pies

                 08.07.2000 - 

                 John Tamihere's emotion-charged confession of his
                 drink-driving convictions was Parliament's ghastly
                 equivalent of a Stalinist show trial, even though his
                 offences were real and not imagined. 

                 The Labour MP's penitence begged the obvious
                 question: who would be next in line for purge by
                 anonymous attack, fax or otherwise? 

                 Yesterday an anonymous caller to a Whangarei
                 newspaper stung National's John Carter with his 1985
                 drink-driving conviction. Carter brushed that off, saying
                 he stood by his 1997 comments that all first-time drink
                 drivers should go to jail. 

                 Before Tamihere's come-clean statement on Thursday
                 afternoon, most politicians had thought Parliament had
                 pulled back from a war of sleaze in which private lives
                 and past indiscretion would be fair game. 

                 MPs pointed to the censure of the Alliance's Grant
                 Gillon for his lewd joke about Tory males preferring the
                 company of sheep, noting the real significance of
                 Parliament's formal condemnation lay in its unanimity. 

                 But the anonymous fax sent to Radio New Zealand,
                 which referred to Tamihere's convictions and his
                 discharge without conviction in a forgery case, gave
                 weight to a minority view that things will get worse
                 before everyone deems enough is enough. 

                 That now depends on whether Labour carries out threats
                 to retaliate against Richard Prebble - plus the media's
                 willingness to pursue anonymous allegations which may
                 have little bearing on an MP's ability to do his or her job.

                 Typically, the Prime Minister cut straight to the political
                 chase once she saw the fax. She ordered Tamihere to
                 get everything out in the open and then fingered Act as
                 the orchestrator. 

                 Labour's evidence of Act's complicity is a list of written
                 parliamentary questions from Act's Rodney Hide dating
                 back to March which allude to the forgery case without
                 saying so. He also asked Clark if she was aware of any
                 of her MPs being charged with a criminal offence. She
                 refused to say, saying it was inappropriate for privacy
                 reasons. 

                 Prebble says he was well aware of Tamihere's past.
                 Clark argues if that was so, why did Hide need to ask -
                 unless he was seeking more publicity for Act's
                 campaign against Tamihere or surreptitiously trying to
                 breach the court's suppression order on the forgery
                 case. 

                 Prebble says the questions were "warning shots" to
                 Tamihere, who was making unfounded allegations
                 against Act during its investigation of how public funds
                 were spent during his tenure as chief executive of the
                 Waipareira Trust. 

                 The author of the anonymous fax miscalculated badly. It
                 gave the Prime Minister a useful distraction,
                 overshadowing embarrassing revelations about binge
                 spending on consultants by Jim Anderton's new
                 Ministry of Economic Development. 

                 But it also provided Clark with a gift opportunity to keep
                 Act squirming. For once, Prebble has looked distinctly
                 uncomfortable after the public doubted his motives in
                 the lead-up to the sacking of Dover Samuels despite his
                 protestations of innocence. 

                 Labour MPs privately say they have plenty of dirt to
                 throw back at him. But the public judges the accusers
                 as much as the accused. It makes no sense for Labour
                 to vacate the high ground when public tolerance of
                 political sleaze is exhausted. And it would also clash
                 with Labour's election promise to set new standards of
                 political behaviour. 

                 For those reasons, any targeting of Prebble will not
                 carry Labour's fingerprints. 

                 It is worth noting that the allegations against Samuels,
                 the latest attack on Tamihere and now Carter did not
                 originate on the floor of Parliament. But the genie is out
                 of the bottle. When the sleaze is oozing into the
                 building it is harder to find the source and stop the flow. 

                 The Samuels, Tamihere and Carter cases have also
                 broken fresh ground because events were dredged from
                 their pasts. Until now, misbehaviour or illegality by a
                 minister or MP was highlighted only if it occurred while
                 they were in the job. What they did before getting into
                 Parliament has generally been considered off-limits. 

                 Samuels' public execution has sobered MPs. As
                 Anderton observed - until Gillon cut the ground from
                 under him - a war of sleaze is a war no one will win. 

                 It is also understood the Speaker, Jonathan Hunt, has
                 been talking to senior MPs to ensure there is some
                 thought about the impact on Parliament's standing
                 before anyone dishes the dirt. 

                 But he is handicapped by two things which have
                 radically altered Parliament in the past decade - there
                 are far more parties under MMP and television cameras
                 now track everything in the chamber. 

                 Previously, the old two-party club kept things
                 reasonably tidy because if one threw a bit of dirt it knew
                 it would get a mud pie back in its face. 

                 But it is not in minor parties' interests to abide by that
                 gentleman's agreement when they are desperately
                 trying to wrench voters away from National and Labour. 

                 It is also convenient for Labour or National to let a minor
                 party do its bidding, knowing that while the minor party
                 gets the immediate attention, big brother will probably
                 reap any spinoff at the polling booths. 

                 That is another reason Labour will not retaliate against
                 Act in any direct fashion. The only winner from a sleaze
                 war between Act and Labour is National. 

                 Minor party behaviour is also driven by MMP's 5 per
                 cent threshold and opinion polls which gauge how far
                 away each party is from parliamentary extinction. 

                 This recipe for desperation provokes incessant
                 publicity-seeking in the belief it will drive up ratings.
                 Parties compete relentlessly to offer something each
                 day to titillate the media, particularly when Parliament is
                 sitting and the television cameras are in the chamber. 

                 In such an atmosphere, the long-term health of
                 Parliament as an institution comes second to
                 expedient, short-term interests. While there may now
                 be some respite from allegation and innuendo - the
                 House is in recess for two weeks - don't expect any
                 truce to last

Monster super fund plan still on table: Anderton

By VERNON SMALL deputy political editor

Deputy Prime Minister Jim Anderton yesterday appeared to rock Labour's 
plans for a mammoth superannuation fund,
saying it was  just one option for solving the  looming pension crisis.
 He later threw his weight behind
the scheme, that
 some pre-funding of' baby boomers'
pensions was Government policy.
"The Government has agreed to pre-funding - that's the Coalition, and the Alliance is part 
of it."
But he said the Alliance was worried about borrowing to top up the fund when the 
Budget was in deficit.
"Contributions should be tailored to the buoyancy of the Government's accounts."
The Alliance would back an affordable pre-funding option but not if essential services 
were cut to maintain it.
"We don't want an option that puts unnecessary pressure on interest rates. That means 
you have got to be careful about the extent to which you fund it from borrowing."
Labour wants to tag a portion of taxable income to cover rising pension costs over the 
next 20 or 30 years. The Alliance and the Greens have doubts about that approach.
Finance Minister Michael Cullen is prepared to consider other methods  such as diverting 
a portion of
 total Government revenue into the fund. But that would still see the Government 
effectively borrowing to top up the fund when the Budget was in deficit.
Mr Anderton said the Alliance wanted to see broad cross-party support on
superannuation. However, it would not sanction a means-tested benefit.
National finance spokesman Bill English poured cold water on the possibility of 
supporting a Coalition proposal.
He said if it was to start by April 2001 it would need to be included in the June Budget, 
and "we are not going to be stampeded into constructing a policy in two months."
 Last week's Budget Policy Statement assumed that by 2004 the fund would total $3 
billion plus.

Auditor-General fears 'compromise'

By Audrey Young
Political reporter

The Auditor-General, David Macdonald, will try to stop Parliament 
granting itself the power to direct his work priorities
as it "could be seen to compromise my independence."
Ironically, the measure is part of a bill aimed at formalising the 
Auditor-General's already de facto role as an independent officer of Parliament.
He will join a select group paid by Parliament but not subject to 
ministerial direction - the Ombudsmen and the
Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.
The Public Audit Bill also extends the Auditor-General's reach beyond the 
balance sheets of hospitals and other
crown entities to auditing their efficiency and effectiveness.
State-owned enterprises will stay
outside the mandate but the Reserve
Bank will be added to it.
The bill is due to be introduced this afternoon by Alliance leader and Minister in Charge 
of the Audit Department, Jim Anderton. 
In a new accountability measure, the Auditor-General will have to consult the Speaker 
and a relevant select committee about his annual plan of work, a move Mr Macdonald 
welcomes. But if there is disagreement over priorities, Parliament pass a resolution to 
direct him.
Mr Macdonald said the provision was not appropriate, even if it were never used.
"The Auditor-General needs to be independent of Parliament as well as of the Executive."
He will make submissions to the finance and expenditure select committee which will 
consider the bill. But if it remained unchanged, he could "live with it."

The power game
Pig in a poke
The most controversial figure at the Press Gallery's mid-year bash this 
week was the leg of ham.
Education Minister Trevor Mallard's two front teeth snapped off their 
dental plate after he chomped too
enthusiastically into a hidden lump of gristle.
And the Greens' anti-sow-crate campaigner Sue Kedgley was not shy in 
letting her hosts know what she thought of
"the vile pig."
(Missing his teeth, Mallard still delivered a speech to phys-ed 
teachers 
early the following morning.)
 Hacked off
Labour MPs ran a gauntlet of microphones and cameras on their way to 
their weekly caucus meeting as journalists
seek out ministers for comment on pressing issues.
Last Tuesday, Judith Tizard turned the tables, pulling out her own 
camera 
and capturing a couple of hacks on film
while other reporters retreated for cover.
Purl of wisdom
In an eerie echo of the French Revolution, Speaker Jonathan Hunt has 
affirmed the quaint long-standing rule that MPs'
spouses may knit or embroider in one of Parliament's public galleries.
Lesser mortals are not allowed to do anything which might disturb 
proceedings, with a ban placed on cameras,
radios, mobile phones, laptops and television sets.
The ban also extends to "umbrellas and long overcoats or raincoats 
under 
which offensive items could be concealed."
There does not appear to be a rule banning watchers from falling 
asleep.
The black sheep
After he made his quip about Tory males and sheep, Alliance whip Grant 
Gillon returned to his office to find an e-mail
informing him that a meeting of
South Island MPs had been cancelled.
While we're on the subject, South Island sheep fanner and Otago 
National 
MP Gavan Herlihy did not let the events of
the week deter him from wearing his trademark sheep tie.
 Swapping notes
A few years under house arrest in Jakarta has not dampened the sense of 
humour of East Timorese leader Xanana Gusmao.
At a joint Beehive press conference, he was wildly amused at 
Corrections 
Minister Matt Robson, who joked that the
former resistance leader might offer New Zealand advice on how to run 
its 
home detention scheme.
 Who's the boss?
Helen Clark has a justified reputation as a control freak, but it is 
not 
a recent phenomenon.
 She told a Wellington conference that in her early days as a 
politician 
she shared a secretary with Geoff Braybrooke,
now Deputy Speaker.
"I eventually crowded him out completely.
"I kept my secretary so busy there was almost no time for Mr. 
Braybrooke, 
who used to complain he had to write all
his letters by hand."
THEY SAID IT
"I ask the
 minister whether,
 no pun intended,
 it's appropriate in
 this case for a
 woman's body
 parts to be inser-
 ted into a sheep
 when that has
 normally been the
 domain of Tory males?" - Alliance whip Grant Gillon finds not everyone 
shares his sense of humour.
"It was as though someone had removed the manhole cover and effluent 
had flowed out." National's Simon Upton on Gillon's behaviour.
"It's not the end of Western civilisation." 'Alliance leader Jim 
Anderton defends his whip
"My job would be on the line."
Labour senior whip Rick Barker shows solidarity with his Coalition 
partner.
"One can draw a tentative conclusion- about protesting, too much." - 
Labour's Pete Hodgson on National's outrage.
"It seems a lot of people around here have lost their sense of humour; 
certainly, their sense of proportion." - Gillon
refuses to be contrite.


