7 October 2001

- Pay-Outs to Air New Zealand Departing Directors Should Be Ruled Out

- Peters Commends Burdon for Declining Possible Retirement Package

The Rt Hon Winston Peters MP, Leader of New Zealand First, today commended former Trade Minister Philip Burdon for publicly assuring New Zealanders that he would not accept a payment from Air New Zealand as a departing Director if it was offered.

“Mr Burdon went one step further and said that it would be inappropriate for a retirement package to be offered - let alone accepted. On that point I, and I would suspect the majority of New Zealanders, are also in agreement.

“Regardless of provisions in the airline’s constitution, given the present circumstances no retirement allowances should be offered - and they certainly should not be accepted. If the departing directors put the interests of the airline and the country, above their own interests, there is little doubt they will all respond as Mr Burdon has.

“Better yet the new board could go a long way towards restoring public confidence in the airline, and its management, by ruling out such payments altogether,” said Mr Peters.

ENDS

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>