Rt Hon Winston Peters

New Zealand First Leader

8 August 2013  

Teapot Tape Revelations Outrageous Says Peters

The partial revelation of the teapot tape investigations by Police today show an outrageous disregard of procedure and legal process, says Rt Hon Winston Peters.

Mr Peters says a close examination of comments of the tape recording on YouTube shows that from the outset, and without any evidence, police believed that New Zealand First was involved in taping the conversation between Banks and Key.

“Nothing could have been further from the truth. The police based their claim on the sight of a young New Zealand First supporter wearing a party T-shirt. He was there as a spectator.

“Now it transpires that I was on the Police shopping list for offenders. My name was on a police file bandied around the Prime Minister’s office and no doubt distributed to the National Party’s propaganda merchants.

“At no stage did Police call me and ask any questions. Nor did they advise me or my lawyer that the investigation was moving in my direction.”

Mr Peters says at no stage did he receive information about the contents of the tape from the cameraman Bradley Ambrose.

“This was a politically inspired police investigation to shut down the fallout from the Key/Banks attempt to form a coalition government in a café in broad daylight.

“It is unbelievable that this could happen in a democracy like New Zealand. The prime minister’s office and Police had no right to act this way.”

Transcript : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvEOh2KOTqg

Key:. So, you want to do the standup? Is that yours? Is that yours? Is that yours?
Banks: No.
Key: Hey, that’s a recording device.
***Mumbling***
DPS Officer: Potentially it was that NZ First guy
Banks:  That’s ok.
Unknown man: Someone’s recording device.
Unknown woman: Let’s take it with us.

ENDS

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