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25 August 2008 Media Statement

What did Maurice really want to say?

Embedded formatting left in an email sent out by National to 'clarify' its $50-road tolls policy has deepened the mystery.

Progressive leader Jim Anderton says the email formatting shows an earlier draft of the statement was heavily edited to remove Mr Williamson's original intent.

The headline reads "Statement on roading". The word roading has been inserted to replace another word - presumably "road tolls."

The second paragraph has had the words "for major new roads, one of which is of course" inserted. This implies the original intention was for the sentence to state tolling was an option for all roads.

The final three sentences were entirely inserted. Before Mr Williamson's first draft was tampered with, the statement did not have Mr Williamson expressing contrition for letting his 'enthusiasm' go unchecked.

Jim Anderton says the inadvertent formatting disclosure is further evidence of National's secret agenda.

"They can't get their story straight, because underlying National's borrow and hope economic policy is a massive hidden tax campaign to claw the money back. A small clique is writing National's secret agenda and not even the spokespeople on National's front benches are being told. Where have we heard that before?

"It reminds me of David Lange's government, of which he said 'if we had told people about our policies, they wouldn't have liked them."

ENDS

John Minto: Supercity contracts out democracy to the private sector

The dangers in the ACT/National coalition agreement are becoming clearer by the day.

The agreement goes well past maximising ACT’s 3.5% electoral support. As part of the arrangement ACT Leader Rodney Hide got himself one of the most influential cabinet roles as Minister of Local Government ahead of the development of the so-called Auckland supercity.

Up till now the focus on democracy has been how the councillors will be elected. Firstly ACT vetoed guaranteed Maori representation on the council but supported the proposal for eight councillors to be elected at large alongside just 12 elected from local wards. More>>