Rodney Hide

ᔥ NZ Herald

Rodney Hide is obviously relishing his new role as a columnist. I am enjoying his writing. Today’s Herald column is about the benefits of pigs and meat:

The way to cure a vegetarian is to cook bacon. The smell of sizzling bacon invariably proves irresistible. The sizzle saves having to explain how humans have eaten meat for two million years.

It’s the eating of meat that makes us human. The nutrient-dense meat enabled the human brain to grow and the gut to shrink. Our mammalian metabolism could not support a big gut and a big brain. Something had to give.

Our primate cousins have a large gut and a small brain. Their gut serves as a giant fermentation chamber. The bugs inside digest the leaves and shoots to produce the fatty acids all mammals need. Gorillas get the fat they need from the bugs that digest the plants they eat. We get our fat direct from other animals.

Eating animals enabled our metabolism to support a larger brain. In turn, hunting animals put selective pressure on an ever-larger brain. It was no mean feat bringing down the equivalent of a modern-day deer with just a spear.

We are lucky. Evolution has treated us well. Eating bacon and having a big brain sure beats having to chew grass all day.

Plus bacon helped halt cannibalism in New Zealand…perhaps:

I suspect Captain Cook bringing pigs to New Zealand did more to end cannibalism among Maori than the preaching of missionaries. Pigs are easier to catch and kill than your neighbours.

More importantly eating meat and a high proteinn diet is better for you:

I eat bacon most days. I regard it as a heritage thing. The Greenies would have us pay homage to our ecology: I do so by eating bacon. My health has improved out of sight since I dumped low-fat yoghurt, fruit juice and sugar coated-cereals and loaded up instead with bacon and eggs.

My doctor tells me my blood panel is the best it’s been. I daren’t put her certificate at risk by telling her that I have achieved the turnaround by doing the exact opposite of what the Government and nutritional experts all say.

I favour two million years of successful evolution over politically-appointed, Government-run committees of experts. These committees easily run away from common sense and common experience. They recommend industrially-produced margarine over naturally-made butter. Margarine is engineered gunk. Butter is grass, plus sun, plus a cow. It’s our best health food.

I eat only New Zealand bacon. I like to know my pigs lived as pigs, ate as pigs and aren’t shot through with chemicals. I reckon these pigs taste better and are healthier.

I especially like the wild pig I buy from the South Island. I jumped at the chance to go out with the boys high in the hills above the Awatere River. The sun was bright, the air was clean and the country wild. As Premium Game’s Allan Spencer explained, these pigs don’t survive unless they’re healthy. No vet gets near them.

The only downside to a diet of meat is that if you buy your meat it is expensive…now that I am getting away more and actually killing my own meat it is a whole lot cheaper.

There is only one thing better than eating meat and that is eating meat you have killed, dressed and cured yourself.

ᔥ NBR.co.nz

Yesterday I blogged about Rodney Hide’s previous NBR column, they have now put his latest one online. Rodney talks about genetics and the problems that welfare causes with natural selection:

Our genetics, our physiology, our psychology, are that of a hunter gatherer. It’s little wonder that socialism is the dominant and most potent political force in the world today. It’s entire emotional appeal, and hence its political appeal, is that of the extended family.

Our capitalist experience interacting with people we never know or meet has proved explosively productive but is but a blip in our genetic history. We have to think, and to reason, to understand the order the market provides.

The emotional appeal of socialism requires no thinking or reasoning. It’s imprinted deep within our genetic makeup and our hunter-gatherer psychology.

The tug of socialism certainly is strong.

The pair-bond and the privatisation of sex occurred early in our history. The pair bond enabled men to co-operate and to hunt with the knowledge that their wife’s children were most likely theirs. The pair bond meant women did not get to mate with the best kid on the block but had at least a mate who would bring home the bacon and defend them and their children.

Interestingly, modern genetics shows a small proportion of wives have always had children to men other than their husbands. The present rate in the United States is between five and ten percent. There’s an evolutionary logic for a woman to have one man to look after her and another to father her children.

In past times the selection pressure was for a mate that was useful. Men who could not hunt and defend their family did not get sex, did not have children, and their genes disappeared. Our forebears were the winners, against all odds, in a tough environment, with violent neighbours and ferocious food.

Weak genetic material gets weeded out. The strong breed more strong descendants. But in modern society there is a problem….its called welfarism and socialism:

There were some reproductive stand outs. Genghis Khan did more than conquer and rule. Over two million men in former Mongolian lands carry his Y-chromosome. He had hundreds of wives and so too did his sons.

Our Minister of Social Development Paula Bennett recently identified a modern day Genghis Khan. Our very own Genghis has fathered children to eight different women. But our Genghis is no conquering war lord. He sits insteads within the benefit system. He doesn’t feed his children, he doesn’t shelter them, he doesn’t protect them.

100,000 generations. Then this guy.

The Minister’s solution is to toss in free contraception. That’s to go with the free housing, the free food, the free booze and the free drugs. Good luck with that.

ᔥ NBR.co.nz

Rodney Hide has a great column in the NBR. These are his comments about the Cullen Fund:

The previous administration invented the pretend policy of having a giant government piggy bank to pre-fund future payments. Journalists understand the concept if not the practice of a piggy bank and bought the policy without hesitation and without a thought.

Political success

They wrote the policy up as though it made a difference. Finally, they wrote, someone has done something to fix the problem: future pension payments are to be pre-funded.

The policy has proved a great political success even though it serves no useful public purpose. The $20 billion fund doesn’t change the cost of pension payments one bit. It just ever so slightly shuffles a very small part of the cost forward.

Besides, if the government knew how to invest money to make a buck there would be no need for tax. The government could earn its own money. That we are still taxed suggests the government’s investment skills are no better than the rest of us.

But here’s the thing: Both National and Labour now agree that borrowing money to sink into the Cullen Fund is dumb. But why are we even borrowing money when we have the fund?

There’s $20 billion in the Cullen Fund. That’s twice what the government hopes to make selling off half a stake in power companies and Air New Zealand.

The same logic that sees payments to the Cullen Fund suspended should see the entire fund on the block. Getting rid of the pretend policy would also focus minds on the need for the real policy.

The trouble is politicians have been pretending for so long that the Cullen Fund serves a useful purpose that they now can’t sell it.

But at least it’s easy to see what New Zealand will look like in 20 years: just look at Greece now.

ᔥ NBR.co.nz

Rodney Hide has a great column in the NBR. I love his comments on journalists:

The government is built on policy that serves no useful public purpose.

Insiders know it. Outsiders don’t.

The reason for the disjunct is that journalists serve as the intermediary between insiders and outsiders. Journalists have arts degrees and lost their ability to think while still quite young. They can’t distinguish good policy from the bad.

In my early days – when too young to know better – I would try to engage journalists in rudimentary policy discussion. I mean really, really rudimentary, like there are tough trade-offs and always opportunity costs.

The eyes would glaze. The attention span was less than 30 seconds. I gave up. I am slow. I don’t give up easily. But even I quickly learned that basic policy analysis is beyond the intellectual reach and interest of New Zealand journalists.

Public policy is forged and determined in the grubby, glorious world of politics. There are no philosopher kings in the bowels of the Beehive.

ᔥ NZ Herald

I have publicly battered my share of Government Ministers. I have been battered a few times myself. The stories were big news at the time. They made not a jot of difference to the state of the country.

Most of the public don’t care about politics enough to notice. They just think politicians are dodgy and everything else is background noise when politicians try to explain they aren’t dodgy.

John Armstrong talks about Mark Mitchell being asked to take a dive to let Colin Craig win Rodney to give National a life line. The precedent is when Don Brash endorsed Rodney Hide in Epsom, at the expense of Richard Worth, and Paul Goldsmith was told not to campaign in Epsom in exchange for a safe list position.

The difference between Worth, Goldsmith and Mitchell is Mitchell has a safe blue seat, he has a 20 year career ahead of him, and like most National back benchers it is in his best interests to see National go into opposition so he can get a promotion when all the senior people leave.

Richard Worth was dependent on Don Brash for a job after 2005 so he toed the line. Paul Goldsmith does what he is told and knew what he was getting into when he ran for Epsom. Paul has admirable ideological perspectives but this does not necessarily translate to vote winning. Mark Mitchell, on the other hand, has huge vote winning potential, a strong electorate infrastructure who are now all behind him, and a bright future that becomes only brighter if National loses in 2014.

It is hard to see Mark Mitchell take a dive. A guy who has a track record like Mark likes a scrap, and won’t shy away from one no matter who it is with. Peter Goodfellow is scarcely going to have him quivering in his boots. Mark is used to facing really scary people like armed offenders as a police officer and a whole lot of seriously bad, heavily armed arabs in the middle east, hell bent on killing him.

Really stern words from Peter Goodfellow or Greg Hamilton will likely be met with a polite “Get Fucked”. Far better that National looks to throw McCully under the bus if they really want Colin Craig holding them to ransom.

The continuation of David Garrett’s guest posts on the Rise and Fall of the Act Party.

Previous installments: Part one, Part two.

Decline and fall ? Part III

In April 2011 Rodney Hide told Don Brash  he would support Brash as leader of ACT, thus putting to an end what was in effect a hostile takeover, and the public washing of dirty laundry which was  by then occurring almost  daily.  Things came to a head rather quickly, which meant the “setup” the day after the leadership change  was odd, to say the least.

Brash was the leader of a party he had joined two days before, but had no seat in the House. Rodney and John Boscawen were both MP’s and  Ministers of the Crown.  Brash wanted Rodney gone – from parliament if not the earth – because Brash  viewed Hide as “toxic”, and the proximate cause of all of ACT’s problems. In his imagined perfect world, Hide would  simply disappear, and be replaced as MP for Epsom  by John Banks, a man who did not seem any kind of “fit” with many of ACT’s  principles.

However, Hide had the confidence of the Prime Minister, and was also committed to being the “best MP for Epsom”, a position he had won and then held at two successive  general elections. He saw no reason to resign from either position, and in my view he was quite justified in  seeing  things that way. Whether one agreed or disagreed with Hide’s strategic view, there had never been any question of his competence or work rate, either as a Minister or an MP.

ACT MP John Boscawen looks on at a press conference after the first ACT Party Caucus Meeting on May 3, 2011 in Wellington, New Zealand. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

The situation was ripe for the kind of shambles that is now ironically being played out a year or so later – an ongoing and unwelcome distraction for the government, and daily further ignominy for ACT. Thankfully for all concerned, fate had delivered   John Boscawen as Deputy Leader of the Party,  a man disliked by no-one important, and trusted by anyone who mattered  as an honest broker.

One could write another book – albeit an  unsaleable one  – on the machinations which occurred in an attempt  to resolve the apparent impasse. When the smoke cleared, Brash had agreed not to continue trying to rid himself of Hide “by lunch time”, Hide had agreed to step down at the 2014 election, Boscawen became the leader of the parliamentary caucus, and the bit players continued their roles.

While all this was happening,  back at party HQ Brash was selling the idea of his mate Banks succeeding Hide as candidate and then MP for Epsom.  Those with much longer track records in ACT than me remain puzzled how Brash convinced the Board to accept Banks as the vehicle for bringing Brash himself, and presumably one or two others into parliament at the 2014 election.

Everyone else has a theory, so here’s mine. Brash had promised the Board two things if he was leader of the Party. First,  that he would bring in large sums of money which would not be forthcoming if Hide remained. Second, he would increase the Party’s vote at the election later in the year to at least 15%. It is hugely ironic given the public perception of ACT as “the rich pricks party” that in the first quarter of 2011 it was as usual broke, and scrabbling to pay the bills.

We now know that the party managed to raise and spend almost $1.3 million at the 2011 election. Presumably,  some of that money had begun to flow in  as soon as Brash became leader. If so, it  seems credible  to assume that the Board were persuaded that Brash was indeed  the new messiah – after all he had pulled off a coup that had seemed laughable only weeks before, and his promises of being able to deliver money were coming to fruition. Surely a party vote of  15% – Brash apparently thought it would be more like  40% – was as deliverable as the money?  As long as  they followed the prescription of the good doctor.

So Banks was confirmed as MP in waiting in Epsom, and the train clattered on, its couplings increasingly strained, but still in one piece. For a while, it must have seemed that the storm clouds had cleared, and after November 2011, there would be a solid ACT caucus of Brash, Banks, John Boscawen and two or three others. Senior ACToids have apparently always been very optimistic.

Then, a new bombshell. John Boscawen announced he would not contest the election and would retire from politics “to spend more time with his family”, a well used political cliché normally employed to cover up something sinister. Since John is unmarried and has no children, it was assumed by the feverish media that the real reason for John’s decision must surely be something else. Wrong again. John meant exactly what he said, and knowing him as I do, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone had to explain to him  what the cliche normally meant.

For me, the next seemingly inexplicable decision was to abandon the Party’s law and order focus completely in favour of education and the usual “market forces and deregulation” economic policies. This despite the Party having achieved a major victory in the “three strikes” legislation, and  for that and other reasons, having the tacit support of the Sensible Sentencing Trust, probably New Zealand’s most effective lobby group.

The appointment of a 25 year old university student as Justice Spokesman, and the concurrent  release of some totally silly policies led quickly  to Garth McVicar publicly telling his supporters that ACT had lost its way, and urging them to consider which other party best articulated SST’s goals. This was a not-so-subtle steer in the direction of the fledging Conservatives. The result?  ACT got  a lower Party vote than the Mana Party, and the Conservatives – which none of the pundits  had  taken  seriously – got 2.8%,  six months after being formed. Coincidence? Who knows.

Then three months after the worst election result in its history, the Banks fiasco. A week is certainly a long time in politics, and who knows what the coming  sitting week will bring. Every political columnist has a theory or a prediction. The end of the week could see anything from Banks resigning from parliament – which in my view is unlikely – to the vultures in the mainstream media finding some new sideshow upon which to demonstrate how far the fourth estate has fallen since the likes of Ian Templeton or even Barry Soper began their careers as political journalists.

I understand that much of the debacle surrounding Banks stems from his refusal to take advice – which must surely have been to  STFU and keep his head down. As Rodney Hide noted last Sunday, Banks is a politician from another era. He was used to Ministers giving press conferences – from which they might exclude journos they didn’t like. He was used to  a time when journalists called Ministers “Mister” and wouldn’t dream of chasing  them through building lobbies thrusting microphones up their noses. He must think he has mysteriously found himself elected to  a foreign and not the New Zealand parliament. As they say, the past is another country.

Can ACT survive all this? Who knows.  Hide and others have pointed out that ACT has been written off many times, but Phoenix like, somehow always rises again. For what it is worth, I doubt it can survive the collective  blows inflicted on it which I have traversed in these three posts.  Even if it does manage to stay alive to  contest the next election, if the Conservative Party can avoid being branded “just another bunch of God botherers” and do significantly better than ACT in 2014,  I believe, with some sadness, that  would indeed be the final ACT, and the end of a remarkable story.

Decline and Fall? Part II

As the cliché has it, a week is a long time in politics. There may never have been – at least in New Zealand – a better example of that maxim than the week of 13 to 19 September 2010. I began the week giving a speech on “three strikes” to a Rotary Club in East Auckland on the Monday evening. The “three strikes” law had passed, and I was doing everything I could to communicate to voters that it was a major policy win for ACT. By the following Friday, I had resigned from the ACT caucus in disgrace, and was on the run in the South Island, trying to shield my children from the howling dogs in the media who were trying to find us.

The reason for my downfall has been written about ad nauseum – including by me – and there is little point going over old ground here. Suffice it to say if Rodney’s trip to Europe was the first large nail in ACT’s coffin, for those whose agenda was personal aggrandizement rather than the interests of the party, my downfall was a godsend.

To the best of my knowledge, my friend Roger Douglas never joined the “Hide brought Garrett into the party and therefore it’s all his fault” bandwagon, although he certainly would not have been unhappy that Rodney was once again having to endure a grilling from both the media and those in the Party who were determined that he should be replaced.

WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND - MAY 03: ACT MP Heather Roy talks to media after the first ACT Party Caucus Meeting on May 3, 2011 in Wellington (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

Heather Roy however suddenly developed a serious case of amnesia about what had been discussed in my office in Albany when I disclosed the details of my sorry scam 27 years before. Following her own agenda, she was at the front of the “it’s all Hide’s fault” pack of baying hounds determined that my downfall would quickly be followed by Hide’s.

Following my resignation, I was largely out of the loop, but I record my everlasting gratitude to John Boscawen, who continued to extol my virtues and my achievement with “three strikes”, and was personally a great support to me and my family during the worst crisis of our lives. John Boscawen’s decision to leave politics immediately prior to the 2011 election was another mortal blow to the ACT Party. John is one of those rare people who no-one dislikes, but who also holds firmly to his principles, and is totally unafraid to stand out from the herd. I am very honoured to count him among my few true friends.

The real problem for Rodney following my departure was my replacement, Hilary Calvert, a long time ACT stalwart from Dunedin. From my limited acquaintance with her, Hilary is a delightful woman, but she quickly became known for a series of gaffes, and she provided even better sport for the left leaning media than I had been. More importantly, whereas with me the ACT caucus was firmly 3 -2 behind Rodney as leader, Hilary’s loyalties were soon revealed to be far less committed.

When the end came for Rodney seven months after her arrival, Hilary’s support for Don Brash over Rodney became decisive.

Don Brash – in many respects a most unlikely politician – had led National in 2005, and but for the debacle involving the Exclusive Brethren church, probably would have led National to victory in the election that year. There is certainly no doubt that his “Orewa” speeches about “one law for all” – another long time ACT policy – were directly responsible for the National Party virtually doubling their vote as compared with the previous election in 2002. The quite brilliant John Ansell billboards – the best of them the now legendary “Kiwi not iwi” series - reflected the concerns of middle New Zealand, and expressed in visual sound bites what Brash had articulated in much more detail in the speeches.

Following National’s defeat by a whisker in 2005, Brash was quickly replaced as leader by John Key, and Don largely disappeared off the political radar – although I do recall him not infrequently coming into the chamber and watching the proceedings from beside the Speaker’s chair, as all former MP’s are entitled to do. Clearly “the Don” was not finished with politics.

At one time, Brash was known among ACT insiders as “ACT’s tenth MP”. His sympathies were and clearly always had been in favour of the free market, limited government, a hard line on law and order, and no laws favouring one race of New Zealander over others – all key ACT policies. That notwithstanding, during February and March 2011, as it appeared more and more obvious that he would challenge Rodney for the leadership, no-one anywhere on the political spectrum could quite believe it. Political soufflés rarely rise twice – particularly in two different parties.

Two who did rise a second time were Brash – albeit fleetingly – and Peters.

Leaving aside differences in political principles and beliefs, the contrast between the wily, suave and teflon coated Peters and the bumbling Brash could not be more stark. That is the main reason no-one in ACT – or the media – initially took Brash seriously.

But by early 2011, ACT’s poll support was dismal, and major backers had deserted the Party. Brash promised that he would rejuvenate the Party’s fortunes – both in financial terms and in the polls. There is no doubt he truly believed that the 40% odd support National had gained in 2005 was down to him personally, and that were he to be leader, ACT’s support among voters would leap dramatically.

AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND - APRIL 28: Dr Don Brash speaks to the media after ACT leader Rodney Hide resigned.

As the “Mr Magoo” like Brash managed one astonishing and unexpected triumph after another in his drive for the leadership of ACT, the tide against Hide became stronger and stronger. Hilary Calvert – whose vote in support of Hide was crucial – changed sides a number of times. Eventually, even the loyal and stalwart John Boscawen came to believe that Rodney ought to step down for the good of the Party.

I firmly believe Rodney Hide always had the good of the Party – and the country – paramount in his mind. Although he has been accused of “selling out for the baubles of office”, I am convinced that is not the case. As a recent interview with the reptilian Guyon Espiner makes clear, once Rodney saw the writing clearly on the wall, he did his best to assist Brash carry off his coup – although he did draw the line when Brash asked him where he should park his car before administering the coup de grace at ACT headquarters in Newmarket, before a phalanx of eager reporters and their cameras

I watched that press conference from a back room, and after it was over, saw Rodney take Brash into a private meeting with then Chief of Staff Peter Keenan to discuss the mechanics of the handover. I was astounded at Hide’s dignity and apparent good humour, when a lesser man would, at the very least, have simply walked off and left Brash to it.

And so Dr Don Brash – who joined ACT on the day of the coup which made him leader – took over the reins of the party, firmly convinced that in short order he would deliver not the 15% of the vote which he publicly claimed, but the 40% he truly believed would defect from National and follow him to ACT. The third four inch nail in the ACT coffin – the first two being Rodney’s disastrous trip, and my departure in disgrace – was nailed home.

NBR has a column from Rodney Hide (not online but it should be). I’d far rather read what Rodney has to say any day of the week than try and work out which corporate client Matthew Hooton is shilling for with his column.

In today’s columns he lists the 10 things he has concluded.

So here’s a part list of what I have concluded:

1. The earth is cooling; 2.  Greenpeace are the new fascists; 3. Treaty settlements are counterproductive to race relations and maori development; 4. Welfare keeps us poor; 5. Butter is health food; 6. Healthy whole grains are anything but; 7. The UN is a joke; 8. Government is irreparably broken; 9. Business success does more for the poor than do-gooders droning on in  the newspapers; 10.  Helen Clark is a woman to admire and respect.

I’m not sure about point 10.

David Garrett phoned me about his series of guest posts. We disagree on his end hypothesis, but since I am not one to only publish echo chamber views here is his guest post about what he believes is the demise of the ACT party. There are two more parts.

Decline and Fall – the final ACT? (Part I)

The ACT party was formed by two former Ministers from opposite sides of the political divide – Derek Quigley and Roger Douglas. Both men had demonstrated that they were willing to think outside the political square in order to find “a better way” to improve the lives of all New Zealanders than had hitherto been offered by the two main parties. Both had also shown  they were not prepared to always toe the party line regardless of how silly or pointless they personally saw that  line to be.

At its height, ACT had nine MP’s, the best of which were superb – like Richard Prebble – and others whose names are now  virtually unknown. While in opposition, ACT MP’s could do little to change things. Ironically, arguably their most effective action – Rodney’s “perk busting”, which led to the revelation that  Labour  Speaker Jonathon hunt spent more than $20,000 on taxis in a year – later came back to haunt Rodney and ACT, and arguably begin the possibly terminal decline of the Party. Whether the decline is  terminal presently remains to be seen.

After almost being wiped out in 2005, in 2008 ACT got its big chance – five MP’s, and becoming a crucial support party to a centre right government led by National. In Rodney Hide, they had a leader who was certainly one of the smartest political operators in a generation.  In the “three strikes” policy upon which ACT had campaigned strongly, they had a policy and  draft legislation  that could potentially be supported by  National  – although the smart money at the time was that it would die in Select Committee – but be recognized and promoted  clearly as ACT and not National policy.

Unfortunately, the 2008 ACT caucus also contained the already germinating seeds of its own destruction in the form of Sir Roger Douglas and Heather Roy, a woman of limited intellect and even less personality,  who had hitherto made no impact at all on  public consciousness. Sir Roger, who I came to regard as a friend,  had a dislike of Rodney, the depth of which I did not understand,  either  then or now.

Roger fundamentally disagreed with the direction we took, which could be summarized as “help keep the centre right in power, and take our wins and the credit for them when we can.” It was a view which I thought was the right one, and one in  which I supported Rodney from the first to the last. Because he disagreed with that course, Roger was determined to replace Rodney with Heather Roy  as leader – at least initially –  and then, when he had gained enough experience, with John Boscawen.

Roy was always too stupid to realize that she was just a pawn, and that Roger’s promotion of her was merely a move in a longer game. Roy was supported in her delusions of ability by one Simon Ewing-Jarvie, a former army officer who became Roy’s most trusted confidante and advisor. Ewing-Jarvie also quickly became a major cause of friction between Roy and Rodney when the latter unearthed – through his extensive network – information which indicated that Ewing-Jarvie was likely to cause serious trouble, both to  Roy  personally and to  the ACT Party.

From the first, Rodney made it crystal clear that we could not survive factionalism. I will never forget the first caucus meeting when he told us we were in the “death zone of New Zealand politics”, and that no small party had survived intact once it had joined in government with a larger party; the Alliance Party perhaps being the best example – until now – of self destruction.

The first chance Roy and Roger got to try and remove Rodney was following Hide’s disastrous decision to use one of the very “perks” he had campaigned so publicly against  to take his then girlfriend with him on a Ministerial trip to the USA and Europe. The trip was entirely within the rules, but that was not the point. If in fact he ever really did, it took Rodney a very long time to “get” that public perception was everything, and the fact that he had complied with the rules meant little or nothing  to the public. Ironically, it is the same  lesson John Banks is slowly learning now.

Roy could barely restrain her glee at the pressure Rodney faced over “the trip”. Roger remained a smiling enigma throughout; John Boscawen and I supported Rodney without reservation – at least in public. Once Rodney had  made his mea culpa  on television, there was never any doubt in John and my minds that he deserved our continuing support.  By the time the saga died down – once the left aligned media had milked every last drop from it  – the score was clearly   Camp Hide  1, Heather Roy and Roger 0.

The next major opportunity to remove Hide was of course following  my own downfall, which was engineered to occur when Hide   Hide Huidwas out the country. By that time, I had unequivocally aligned myself with him, and at a party meeting open to the public, verbally slapped down a party member who was pushing for Hide’s replacement by Roy. A week or so later, all hell broke loose.

Ironically, I am one of the few members of “team Rodney” who is by no means sure Roy was behind the leak which was to end my career, and  to  later become a major contributor  to  Hide’s downfall. I realized from the very first time Hide approached me to stand that  “the passport scam” was likely to emerge and cause serious trouble, both for me personally, and for ACT.

Hide took the view that the wrongdoing was so long ago – I had committed the offence in 1984 – that it would be of no consequence, and if it did emerge, they would “handle it.” At a later meeting at my then office in Albany, I was asked whether I had skeletons in my closet. I am on record as replying that I did,   “ a big f….rattling one”.

Those at that meeting were John Boscawen, Roger Douglas, an ACT board member, and Heather Roy. I explained what I had done and how, and repeated the truth: that I had no reason to do it, and at the time I simply saw it as a prank. To their  great credit, other than Roy, none of the others at that meeting have ever denied that I made a full disclosure of what I had done so  long before, and its sequel in a court case three years earlier,  in 2005.

Not long after that meeting in Albany I was offered list position number five after a former MP “spat the dummy” at being offered a list place much lower than he thought he was worth.  The timebomb began ticking from that point.