Amateur Hour at PM's office

Prime Minister John Key has many more questions to answer about his helicopter ride with the Vela brothers, according to Labour MP Pete Hodgson.

“From the moment the Prime Minister accepted a helicopter lift to Auckland, he and others have been involved in an amateurish cover up.

“Mr Key told us that the meetings he flew to Auckland for were ‘security related’. This is so he doesn’t have to explain any further. The word ‘security’ is supposed to silence any further enquiry. Bill English stuck to that line slavishly in the House today. He even refused to say whether travelling from Hamilton to Auckland by car would have got him there on time, because it wasn’t in the public interest to answer!!

“Then Mr Key, or someone, seems to have arranged for a back dated invoice from the Vela brothers so as to avoid mentioning their name in Mr Key’s register of pecuniary interests.

“It is amateur hour in the Prime Minister’s office. The story is not credible. Here are a few questions that deserve an answer.

• What was the broad nature of the security meetings on a December Friday night in Auckland?
• If he had very limited notice of the meetings, did his office attempt to deploy the RNZAF?
• If he had flown, as previously arranged, back to his waiting VIP limo in Hamilton, would he have arrived in Auckland in time for these ‘security related meetings?’
• Are we to believe that the PM’s ability to attend a ‘security related’ meeting was dependent on the proactive goodwill of a helicopter pilot?
• Why was the Vela brothers invoice dated New Years Eve? Why was its receipt in the PM’s office not noted with a date stamp? Isn’t that most unusual in any parliamentary office?
• How come it took just over two months to approve payment? Does that suggest that the Prime Minister, or staff, flicked out sometime in February 2010 that the pecuniary interest register is a snapshot as at January 31st 2010, and that some backdated paperwork was needed to avoid listing the helicopter ride as a gift?
• Might the main impetus for this slipperiness be that towards the end of 2008 Mr Key decided to exclude Winston Peters from any future government. One of the allegations Mr Peters faced at that time was that he had one or more rides in a Vela brothers helicopter.