I'm a bit pressed for time today, so in my haste have reproduced a post which I put up this morning on Kiwiblog. However, I feel very strongly about this, as do others who were commenting last night, so here goes....
Audrey Young blogs about the exchange (at Question Time on Wednesday) in the Herald this morning:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/feature/story.cfm?c_id=590&objectid=10469114
I went to post a comment, but interestingly, what I got was the following message:
“Thank you for your interest in commenting on the story Iraq war : Blog: Distasteful battle (+audio).
Unfortunately, this forum is now closed for comments.”
What gives Aud? All I wanted to do was alert Herald readers to the most distasteful battle of all that took place yesterday during Q6 - you know, the one where Helen Clark dropped her guard and openly threatened opposition members. May I quote:
“Madam SPEAKER: I accept the point made by the Leader of the House, but I think that in this instance the quote did not meet the test of being unparliamentary. So I ask the Prime Minister to answer the question.
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK: For obvious reasons, I seldom agree with Fran O’Sullivan. My job is to act in relation to Cabinet responsibility issues, not to initiate investigations into the actions of members of Parliament. However, if members opposite want to tempt me, there is always the possibility of investigations into Nick Smith’s contempt of court, Gerry Brownlee’s act of assault, or whether Mr Groser still uses cannabis.”
I wonder why Audrey Young:
1) didn’t comment on the PM’s outrageous, Muldoon-like behaviour, and
2) won’t let anyone else comment on it either.
Thank goodness for the blogosphere!
Bottom line - was this just a throwaway line by Dear Leader, or was she seriously suggesting that as PM she could authorise investigations into the conduct of anyone who opposes her? The ramifications of that are, to borrow a word from the Human Rights Commission "chilling" - is this a foretaste of life under the Electoral Finance Act?
3 comments:
Did she really say that?!? This is scary... to have the PM suggesting that she'd mobilise state resources to investigate opposition MPs. what's next? gulags, imprisioning relatives etc
You think it hasn't already happened...
Why do you think it took 2 years for the Philip Field investigations to come to a head? And why does it so co-incide with his exit from Labour last year?
And why must Randerson J investigate the notion of "undue [read: political] pressure"
and mention also the apparent lack of 15 counts of Bribery and Corruption that should also be charged against those that apparently were a party to the alleged charges.
http://media.apn.co.nz/webcontent/document/pdf/BurgessvsFieldjudgment.pdf
Thanks for that chandler frank - interesting reading!
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