Veteran MP Nick Smith has resigned from Parliament after he became aware that a private employment dispute was about to be splashed all over the media:
National MP Nick Smith is resigning from Parliament on June 10 “for personal and professional reasons, including a current Parliamentary Service inquiry into an employment issue.”
In a statement, Smith said Parliamentary Service had been conducting “a confidential inquiry into a verbal altercation in my Wellington office last July that has not concluded”.
“I was advised on Friday that the inquiry and its details have been leaked to the media for release tomorrow. It is inappropriate for employment disputes to be litigated in public.
“I will put on the record that I regret the incident, I apologised at the time and I apologise again today.
“I have decided the best course of action for the parties involved, the National Party, my family and myself is to retire now.”
NZ Herald
Once again we see the media being used to take the heat off the government’s abject and continued failures, having been leaked private details of a Parliamentary Services inquiry.
I would hope that Parliamentary Services will conduct an investigation as to who was involved in the leak.
Kudos to Nick Smith, who promptly resigned rather than have the media do a perp walk and start all sorts of nonsense based on leaks. He is probably heartily sick of the place after being in Parliament for 31 years, having entered in the Bolger landslide of 1990.
He is the last of the infamous brat pack, which included Bill English, Roger Sowry and Tony Ryall, and so ends that era of party influence.
National also loses another of their wet wing as the caucus dries out. He will be replaced by Harete Hipango.
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