“I can only conclude that Helen Clark is again guilty of telling the public lies, after her refusal to come clean with the facts of a student loan case she cited in a TV debate,” Tertiary Education Minister Max Bradford said today.

During the debate last week, Miss Clark mentioned an unemployed adult student whose loan, she said, had grown from $6000 to $14,000 since he finished studying.

“Under current and former policies we can find no way such an increase could occur because the Government writes off all the base interest that a borrower can’t cover through his or her minimum repayments.

“I wrote to Miss Clark asking her to pass on the facts of the case (excluding the student’s name) within three days.

“Miss Clark was advised that if she failed to respond, I could only conclude the facts were not as she stated them to be,” Mr Bradford said.

“She has failed to front up with the details and as such can only be presumed to have told the public lies on television.

“First Miss Clark misrepresented the circumstances of a beneficiary in a television advertisement, now she has been caught out again. There is a pattern emerging.

“At worst it shows Labour is willing to repeatedly lie to gain office, or at best Labour doesn’t care if its facts are right or wrong.

“Either way, Labour and Miss Clark have shown they can’t be trusted,” Mr Bradford said.

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