Cameron Report Shows Folly of Kiwi Bank

Wednesday 11th Apr 2001 Richard Prebble Media Release -- Governance & Constitution

ACT Leader Hon Richard Prebble said today that pressure from ACT had finally forced the Government to release the Cameron Report into the proposed Kiwi Bank.

“We’ve been trying to get this report released since NZ Post lost its ill-judged attempts, by taking me to court, to gag me from releasing information. Jim Anderton was desperate to prevent this report being made the public because the publication shows that his repeated claim about the Cameron Report supporting NZ Post going into banking is false.

“The publication of the Cameron Report severely damages Mr Anderton’s credibility. He obviously thought he could mislead the public as to the report’s conclusions, believing wrongly he could suppress its contents – claiming a bogus commercial confidentiality.

“ACT’s been successful in getting the report released because we have used the judge’s statements in the High Court to show that where there is going to be a substantial public investment, the public interest has to be in favour of disclosure.

“As we had always suspected and as we’ve been telling the people of New Zealand for months the Cameron Report says the proposal will have negative value for New Zealand Post.

“Knowing full well what was contained in this report, Mr Anderton pressed ahead with the proposal anyway – putting $80 million of taxpayers’ money at risk.

“Even now, not all the information is available to the public as figures have been deleted which the public is entitled to know about. I note particularly the sentence in the summary section which says that ‘as currently formulated we believe the business case is negative value and will require access to … of additional capital’.

“Mr Anderton must be extremely embarrassed today. He has been caught out attempting to mislead the country,” Hon Richard Prebble said.

ENDS

For more information visit ACT online at http://www.act.org.nz or contact the ACT Parliamentary Office at act@parliament.govt.nz.

© Scoop Media