Gerry Brownlee
National Leader of the House

11 June 2002

PM trying to pull a fast one on voters

"Helen Clark's excuse for calling a snap election because of "endless points of order during question time" is totally ridiculous," says Shadow Leader of the House Gerry Brownlee.

Mr Brownlee says since February this year, question time has - on average - only exceeded its allotted one-hour duration by 7.5 minutes a day.

"So what is the Prime Minister saying? She had to call an election because question time was over time 7.5 minutes a day!"

Mr Brownlee says it is arrogant of Helen Clark to dismiss the Opposition's justified questioning of her and Jim Anderton's abuse of the Electoral Integrity Act as time wasting.

"She can't pull a fast one over the voters of New Zealand.

"The fact is that fear of her current polling dropping in the wake of worsening economic and industrial action panicked the Prime Minister into calling a snap election," Mr Brownlee explained.

Ends

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