Media Release

08 October 2003

Say No To Director Pyne Says Peters

New Zealand First is urging Telecom shareholders not to accept Lindsay Pyne as a director of the company when his nomination is discussed on Thursday.

“What is happening to big business in New Zealand when Mr Pyne, chief executive of the Bank of New Zealand when the Government had to bail it out of serious losses, gets nominated as a possible director for Telecom?” said New Zealand First leader Rt Hon Winston Peters.

“How Mr Pyne is deserving and qualified for a position on one of New Zealand’s biggest company boards, given his time with the BNZ, is a mystery to me,”

When with the BNZ, Mr Pyne signed off the bank’s figures for the year 1990, which, later were seen as not presenting a true and fair picture of the results by the Securities Commission. Mr Pyne did this notwithstanding he had also been part of the audit sub-committee that advised that the accounting policy used by the bank was inappropriate.

The BNZ’s Captive Insurance scheme, at that time used to disguise the true state of the banks accounts and forecasts, was nothing but a “creative accounting scam”.

“I question the decision to put forward Mr Pyne’s name as a possible choice of director and would like to know what Mr Pyne has been doing for the last ten years that now equips him with the skills needed for such a position,” said Mr Peters.

“However Telecom shareholders have it within their power to stop this totally unsuitable candidate from becoming a director and they are urged to do so,” said Mr Peters.

ENDS

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