Hon Roger Sowry MP National Party Energy Spokesman

26 May 2004

Hodgson haunted by hysterics and history

"Pete Hodgson should apologise and resign over false accusations levelled at the National Party when it first raised the prospect of power black-outs in the South Island," says National's Energy spokesman Roger Sowry.

In a media statement on 04 October, 2002 the National Party warned of 'brown-outs and black-outs' in the upper South Island after reviewing page 130 of Transpower's own System Security Forecast.

"Mr Hodgson responded with a stream of abuse, accusing the National Party of 'scaremongering', of 'making blatantly untruthful claims', of 'making grossly misleading claims', of 'making demonstrably false claims', of 'an appalling readiness to mislead' and of being 'desperate and dishonest'. "Mr Hodgson said of National's then Energy spokesman, Gerry Brownlee, that 'his leader must sack him'.

"Time has shown us who should be sacked for showing 'ignorance of how the electricity system works'.

"National's worst fears are proving to be absolutely correct. Transpower predicted these problems.

"It's time this Minister and his Labour Government faced up to the real threat posed to our electricity sector by the nonsensical Resource Management Act," says Mr Sowry.

ENDS

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