Mike Williams.. that's a damn good idea..

Guyon Espiner from TVNZ pwns Labour party president. Either he's a blatant lier and thinks he can continue doing it, or (possibly more likely) he's a bit past it and is getting forgetful. Either way, time for a change perhaps.

R

politico speak

needs more winston pters

The fact is, not for the first time Espiner has broken an undertaking not to record or report the proceedings of a CLOSED session of the Labour Party congress in Wellington. Journalists are given privileged access to these sessions on the understanding they are off the record and non attributable.

The sad thing about this is firstly, if you listen to it clearly Williams was doing a throw away line and secondly Espiner's action will possibly result in BOTH main parties restricting losing trust in senior journalists to something as simple as keeping their word.

Williams lied about it. For sure the tone may have been a throw-away line - I wouldn't argue that he'd be that stupid to give the idea serious consideration. But, he did say it and was caught telling porkies about it.

And it is what use is a closed session if you let the exact people in who have the most potential to cause problems like this? They should know better by now.

Actually, do we know that Espiner was the person who recorded it? (I haven't watched/read any news today yet).

Just assuming Espiner did record it under some sort of agreement, at what point can the promise be broken when they know someone is clearly lying about something and calling it a media beat up etc?

The whole thing could have been a nothing even if they'd just stuck with the "it was a throw-way comment" story. But Williams didn't play along and, no matter the reason/source, has just made himself look an egg (again).

R

I wish we didn't have 'political' reporters on telly, as it seems they do a lot of work creating stories to justify their paychecks when really there is no big story here

some stupidness, yes... but we've come to expect idiotic comments and retractions/back downs and the like from our politicans and their party faithful

at least we haven't quite reached the levels of Rumsfeld et al when it comes to constructive use of the english language

something makes me think that if the 'media' just left the politicians alone they would do a better job of running the country

But then who would keep the Phillip-Fields and Winston Peter's of the world on the ground?

R

who cares?
'greasing the wheels...' and all that

a few million get skimmed off and the country runs better. simple cost benefit

(and no i dont personally believe that... but i dont believe in any sort of centralised government so thats another matter entirely)

what I can't understand is why it took a week for the story 'to break' when it was reported the weekend before last

Because Clark initially stomped on the idea, then on Agenda a week later Williams denied ever saying what was claimed... That evening the tape appeared and was played to show him up.

R

oh ok I was a little bit out of the loop