Face of the Day

Hipkins told Morning Report a member of the party had asked a “silly question” and members gave “silly answers”.

He said they got carried away and despite it not intending to cause offense – it did and members went too far.

Hipkins said he understood if Willis was offended by Edmonds’ comments and she had apologised for that.

“I think that was the right thing to do,” Hipkins said.

“I think it was a ridiculous exercise, I think they got a bit carried away and my message to them has been pretty clear, which is, you’ve got to assume that all of these things are public events and you do need to really make sure you’re focused on, you know, talking about the issues that really matter and this is not one of them.”

Hipkins said there were “hundreds of people” in the room and he didn’t know who had leaked the audio.

RNZ