MEDIA RELEASE
Aug 3, 1999

ACT deputy leader Ken Shirley continues to show abject disregard for consumers through his party's shifting approach to the power reforms, Enterprise and Commerce Minister Max Bradford says.

"ACT stands for self interest, for the interests of the private sector and is prepared to see consumers plundered while its MPs play politics.

"Voters now know exactly where ACT stands. Not on their side, but on the side of vested interests, who are only too happy to reap monopoly profits from ordinary families," Mr Bradford said.

"Four months ago Mr Shirley said 'lines companies must not be allowed to price gouge using their inherent monopoly'.

"He said ACT would continue to put principle before politics, whatever that means in light of what he said four months ago.

"When the heat came on ACT, its principles flew out the window, along with the hopes of consumers for the lower power prices they deserve.

"What an irony for ACT to be lined up with the Alliance, both against consumers and for monopolies, " Mr Bradford said.

© 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>>