Don Brash MP
National Party Leader

09 May 2005

Helen Clark Must Explain Role In Doonegate

Helen Clark must give a full and truthful account of her actions in relation to the defamatory Sunday Star Times story on former Police Commissioner Peter Doone, says National Party Leader Don Brash.

The National Party leader today released a full set of High Court documents from the case.

"Last week Helen Clark told Parliament she had given accurate information to the Sunday Star Times and played down her role in coverage of the affair by that newspaper. Yet a brief of evidence signed by Helen Clark and filed in the High Court tells exactly the opposite story.

"Helen Clark now needs to explain why she has told Parliament one story and provided exactly the opposite account in her signed court documents.

"Briefs of evidence from the Sunday Star Times former editor and the reporter who filed the story are even more damning.

"They show that the newspaper ran its defamatory comments because they thought they had confirmation from someone who had seen the then confidential Robinson and Police Complaints Authority Reports.

"The documents make it clear that without Helen Clark's confirmation and encouragement the newspaper would not have run the story in the first place, and without further confirmation and encouragement they would not have repeated their claims a week later.

"Regardless of the propriety or otherwise of the actions of the former Police Commissioner, these documents show Helen Clark's actions in a most unsavoury light.

"The direct conflict between the court documents and the story Clark has told elsewhere, including under privilege in Parliament, requires a full, frank and truthful account from the Prime Minister of her role in this affair," says Dr Brash.

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