Just seen outside my campaign office on Te Atatu Rd: Crown car pulls over, Hon Rodney Hide gets out and takes a picture of my humble campaign office.
One wonders: Does he like the architecture? The tasteful red and white paint job? Is he getting ready for a new career as a private detective after November? Is this a suitable use of Parliamentary-funded Crown car and driver? If it’s work done as a Minister, will he answer parliamentary questions on it? Can I OIA the photo of my office? I wonder if Tau was miffed that Rodney didn’t snap his office across the road?
Any theories about this strange Ministerial behaviour?
That’s creepy
Make sure there is double locks on the doors and a ‘robust’ security alarm system.
Training to be a private dick? Well, he’s been a public one for long enough …
It will be interesting to see how this unfolds.
Maybe he now owns the building and plans to evict you once his parlimentary career is over so he can set up his P.I office?
Seriously Phil, it sounds like there may be a bit of intimidation going on?
Written back in 2009 . . .
http://dimpost.wordpress.com/2009/06/10/labour-disturbed-by-act-leaders-interest-in-astronomy/
Of course, that’s it. He is going to try and privatise my office! (Thanks Danyl. I loved that post.)
Word on the street is that it was Banksie’s camera and Shirtcliffe paid for the film, and Gibbs will cough for the processing. You know how these things are organised.
Why don’t you just ask him? Seems eminently more reasonable to do so, rather than feed the insecurities of the LWNJ’s
I think it is Rodney’s behaviour which is feeding insecurities rather than this post Lou.
Are we allowed to call people “private dicks” on here now?
Here’s the question though Phil, why do you have an office when Chris Carter already has one and Tau’s is across the road? Te Atatu must have more MPs purporting to represent it than any electorate?
@ Lou Peters
Is it normal for a (busy) Minister of the Crown to stop outside a political opponent’s campaign office and take a photograph of it? No it’s not. It can be reasonably assumed the action was not a friendly one. Sure, Phil can ask him, but I shouldn’t think he would get a truthful answer.
An embarressment of riches! Mine though is a campaign office, not funded by Parliament, and the only Labour one in the electorate.
You’re being slippery on that one CK. All list MPs have offices in their respective electorates, and since Phil Twyford is also the Te Atatu Labour candidate he is entitled to have his office there – just as National candidate and list MP Tau Henare has one there too. Chris Carter’s office is not a Labour Party Office.
Some questions for the Minister for Ministerial Services:
1. Has he distributed any rules, protocols or guidance relating to the use of Crown cars by Minister for party political business?
2. Has Ministerial Services distributed any rules, protocols or guidance relating to the use of Crown cars by Minister for party political business?
3. What expectations, if any, does he have about the use of Crown cars by Minister for party political business?
4. Does he consider it appropriate for Ministers to use Crown cars for party political business; if so, why?
To the Prime Minister:
1. Has he assigned any Ministerial responsibility to the Minister for Local Government for the appearance of campaign offices?
To the Minister of Local Government:
1. What Minister business, if any, did he conduct in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011?
2. Was he undertaking Ministerial business in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011 when he stopped outside 296 Te Atatu Rd, Te Atatu South and took a photo of the premises?
To the Minister for Regulatory Reform:
1. What Minister business, if any, did he conduct in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011?
2. Was he undertaking Ministerial business in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011 when he stopped outside 296 Te Atatu Rd, Te Atatu South and took a photo of the premises?
To the Associate Minister of Education:
1. What Minister business, if any, did he conduct in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011?
2. Was he undertaking Ministerial business in Auckland on the morning of 30 June 2011 when he stopped outside 296 Te Atatu Rd, Te Atatu South and took a photo of the premises?
Phil I hope your leader hasn’t used a crown car for party political business. Because that would be embarrassing for you if he has.
Maybe he just wanted more photos of you but was too shy to ask?
Dear Phil,
1. As you are aware, I personally assigned the Minister a fact-finding mission re local democracy some time ago. We understand the photo will be included in the Minister’s long belated scrapbook presentation to caucus very soon
Yours,
John
Maybe it is the two stop signs facing the intersection that you display.
David – Yeah they must be a terrible hazard. I noticed in the Wendys last night they had a red “stop sign” in their kitchen saying beware of slippery surfaces. I think I’ll report them.
Well people act strangely after betrayal and rejection, they drift about looking for a time of tranquility and happiness. So, perhaps Rodney is planning to look at the photograph of your electoral office to cheer him when he is alone sitting in the waiting room, outside Don Brash’s office.
Why on Earth is any MP’s office a “Party Office”?
we can only hope rodney’s just struggling to deal with his new reality.
then, when it all comes out it should be no more than a bit sad.
i like the “little hitler” by portion control.. pungent..
Because that’s where he goes to par-tay!
Portion control for your info the Labour leader only uses VIP cars on special occasions. It costs the taxpayer too much.
Thanks for the info Annette. According to the list of MPs expenses in the last quarter Phil charged $18,000 in surface expenses, meaning either crown cars or taxis. That’s 80% more than any other Labour MP. This suggests there were a lot of “special occasions” that Phil used the VIP cars. Are you certain that Phil hasn’t used VIP cars or taxis on the taxpayer for Party business?
Because if you’re not certain of that then it would be very embarrassing for Twyford and Phil for Twyford to make an issue with Rodney’s use of crown cars.
PC
You, perhaps deliberately, miss the point. National and Act expecially from 2005 to 2008 continuously attacked Labour for “out of control public spending” and “privilege”. And the individual attacks were pretty appalling.
Phil has chosen to publicise this particular incident as an example of hypocracy, that is the Government are doing what they accused Labour of doing.
Your response is that maybe Labour did it too. But you miss the point that the Government is being hypocritical. Do you approve of Rodney “perk buster” Hide going for jaunts at the taxpayer’s expense?
MS,
I don’t support Rodney. I am saying that if you are going to use Rodney’s use of a crown car for party business as a reason to ask ministerial questions then you had better make sure your own side is clean yourself. Otherwise you risk “hypocracy”.
I don’t care about the personal attacks of the past, I care about the personal attacks now. If Twyford is making a song and dance about Rodney’s use of a VIP car then he and Annette should be very certain that Phil isn’t using his VIP car for other than “special occasions” like she said, that he isn’t using taxis for personal use or party business, and that he isn’t using his blue self-drive VW Passat for personal use or party business.
I can’t speculate on what Phil uses his surface travel on, but when he’s spending $90k a year on it I can speculate that it isn’t all for “special occasions”.
@ Portion Control, going by your nom-de-plume, you clearly don’t work for Gerry. Am I right? So which one is it?
No I don’t work for any MPs or for the taxpayer jennifer. Why do you leap to this conclusion? Do you? Clearly it can’t be Parekura though because I don’t think he would approve of fat jokes. Or is it only okay to make derogatory jokes about people’s weight when it’s about politicians of the opposite side?
The fact that you make derogatory ‘insinuations’ that have little basis in fact is a give-away PC. No, you may not work for MPs (read NAct MPs) or the taxpayer but you clearly have your sticky fingers deep in the NAct pie.
Wait for the vehement denial folks?
I don’t need to make a denial Anne because you’re just making it up. What derogatory insinuations have I made that have little basis in fact?
Or are you going to run away and hide now that you’ve made an insult?
@Portion control – nah, the dude has just been visiting a lot of places, 80% more? – so he should be as leader of the opposition!
Every trip is a special occasion Portion Control, for the lucky people who he visits!
Yes maybe he is working harder than all the other Labour MPs spud, but with that kind of spending it just isn’t true to say that he only charges his surface travel on “special occasions”.
And if he’s visiting more people and that’s the reason for the cost blowout, then maybe he should change his tactic to something that might work better.
” Yeah they must be a terrible hazard. I noticed in the Wendys last night they had a red “stop sign” in their kitchen saying beware of slippery surfaces. I think I’ll report them.” Facetious I know, but the difference would be reasonably obvious Phil, but i’ll spell it out. A kitchen is not on the road, ………..whereas your signs were. Simple really I would have thought.
@ Porton Control
You should know better, PC.
Never let clearly stated facts re spending get in the way of partisan invective.
Saying that, I tend to support Spud’s view that as leader of HMs Loyal Opposition, Mr. Goff should be out there with his soapbox stumping up far more than any other MP, arguably more than the PM himself.
However, you are totally correct that this should not be at public expense if it’s party business (which soapboxing tends to be).
Gregor
To be fair Parliament’s rules do allow for MPs to travel on party business as I understand. The hypocrisy is Twyford getting his knickers all in a twist over Rodney’s use of it, when they do it too. And from a look at the facts, Annette saying that Phil only uses VIP cars for “special occasions” doesn’t stack up either, when Phil has one of the highest costs on surface travel of any MP in the house.
PC, there’s definitely an issue about your guy doing party stuff in the Crown car, but that aside don’t you think it is weird and a bit creepy for a Minister of the Crown to be going around spying on political opponents like this?
The NActoids must be feeling seriously threatened that one of their number was caught out trying to gather evidence of a non-existent misuse of parliamentary funding by a strong political opponent? And what’s more, the ‘number’ in question was the most famous rorter of them all!
Phil he’s not “my guy” which you would know if you had read my comments. Whether he was spying on political opponents is anybody’s guess, but at the moment it is just your spin on it really.
I can’t speculate why he would want to take photos of your office, since Rodney’s retiring and Act aren’t going to get many votes in Te Atatu. Maybe he saw something interesting as he was driving past.
Are you certain that all your signage is authorised? It would be pretty embarrassing for you if Rodney took a photo of something that turns out to ping you for not playing by the rules.
I don’t know about using crown cars or even taxis or self-drive cars for party business, but if Rodney is doing that and it’s against the rules then you should hold him accountable for that. But again it would be embarrassing for you if it turned out that your leader was using his partliamentary entitlements (crown car, self-drive passat, parliamentary taxis etc) to attend party events.
@Portion Control – He is free to use this tactic
@Gregor W – It is part of his job, the public have a right to an effective opposition in the name of democracy!
@Portion Control – Phil does more travelling, so more expensive
Now reading Phil’s comment, at least Phil G doesn’t take creepy photos.
So instead of addressing any of the debating points Anne you just carry on with your dogma and smear. How’s that political engagement going for you then?
So far PC has:
1. Abused others
2. Raised the spectre of Phil Goff’s limo useage
3. Corrected my spelling
But he has not expressed an opinion on Rodney’s limo useage. Does he think it was right that Rodney should use the limo service to drive him to Phil’s office to sneak a photo?
And why the sensitivity? Phil T was trying to lampoon Rodney’s use of limo services. He was not calling for Rodney’s head on a plate …
Fantastic work chaps. Just fantastic. Please keep it up all the way to November.
off WO (Trev’s favourite blog)
Quote ‘To save taxpayer money on the Parliamentary Questions I risked life and limb and rang Hide. He abused me some more for being a dirty coup plotter. And when he had calmed down said he had been with Labour’s Kelvin Davis and Carmel Sepuloni opening the new Arohanui Satellite Class at Edmonton School plum in the middle of the Te Atatu electorate. Tau Henare couldn’t make it but sent along his electorate agent Alex Sie who was duly acknowledged.
Hide was there as the Minister Responsible for Special Needs.
But where was Twyford? And how come he didn’t know about the big occasion in a school in his own wanna-be electorate? And how come Kelvin and Carmel didn’t tell Phil? And how come Phil is drafting Parliamentary Questions to government ministers to find out what is happening in what he thinks is his own electorate?
I asked Hide why he stopped to take the picture? He said it was because he had never seen anything as absurd as two List MPs’ offices dead opposite each other, and in an electorate of a another MP as well.’
Thanks for your input mickysavage.
I did post at 4:30pm regarding Rodney’s limo usage but it’s still in moderation.
1. I haven’t abused anybody. I’ve responded to people in kind where they’ve abused me. So far I’ve been accused of being a Parliamentary staffer, a friend of Hide’s, and of having some kind of agenda to defend him.
2. I thought Phil’s limo usage was fair game when Twyford was attacking Rodney’s.
3. Yes I did correct your spelling but I only did it because you deliberately misinterpreted what I said. In fact you’re doing exactly what you’re accusing me of doing. You want to frame the argument according to your agenda. Your agenda is Labour good, National/Act bad. That might work well when you’re having a nice little committee meeting of two among your hierarchy of Labour buddies, but in the real world there’s a contest of ideas where if you are inconsistent or “hypocratical” then your audience picks up on it.
I hope I didn’t come across and being sensitive. Rodney’s got five more months of limo use. Phil hasn’t shown us yet any evidence that Rodney went out of his way to creepily take photos of somebody’s office.
Rodney’s got five more months of limo use.
Making the most of it isn’t he – at the tax-payers expense
Anne, if you didn’t know Helen gets a crown car whenever she wants it when she’s in NZ too. Do you go and complain to her about her use of a crown car?
It’s good that you’re worried about propriety and taxpayer money with parliamentary spending though. I would have thought that Mr Twyford would be the last person to speak up for that with much credibility, but that’s the great thing about politics, isn’t it? You can say one thing and do another. Or pretend you didn’t do one thing, and say another.
As mickeysavage has already pointed out, PC continues to avoid – at all cost – to comment on the subject matter of Phil Twyford’s post. That is, Rodney Hide’s bizarre behaviour yesterday morning.