Darren Hughes
Shadow Leader of the House

20 May 2009 Media release

National’s abuse of process continues

National’s decision to make Associate Local Government Minister John Carter the chairman of the select committee examining reforms to Auckland governance is yet another abuse of process, says Labour’s Shadow Leader of the House Darren Hughes.

Leader of the House Gerry Brownlee announced today that National would support Mr Carter to become the select committee chairman.

“This is completely inappropriate. Mr Carter was involved in Cabinet committee discussions over the Government’s proposals, which as the Associate Minister of Local Government he has also been instrumental in developing.

“The select committee is supposed to be scrutinising the legislation and ensuring it is subject to an independent analysis. As the chair and one of the ministers pushing this through, Mr Carter will clearly have a conflict of interest.

“This continues the abuse of proper process we’ve seen all the way through over the Government’s handling of its Super City plans,” said Darren Hughes.

“We’ve already had the Government running scared on the appointments to the transition agency and today it was reported this was because the Cabinet feared Local Government Minister Rodney Hide’s proposed chair had a conflict of interest.

“Despite this, National now wants Mr Carter to chair the select committee. You have to wonder National has got to hide,” Darren Hughes said.

“It’s bad enough that there are seven Government MPs on the select committee and just four Opposition MPs.

“We’re counting the Maori Party in with the Government because they voted both ways on the transition legislation which was rammed through under urgency and failed to put up any amendments themselves, so their position is impossible to determine.

“And why is Tauranga MP Simon Bridges on the select committee? Are they planning to merge Tauranga into the Super City as well?”

ENDS

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