Vile, despicable comments from National Party leader Simon Bridges

Simon Bridges’ claim the government is compensating “meth crooks” is vile and despicable.

His comments continue the cruel, abusive derision directed against so many State tenants and beneficiaries under the National government.

Bridges knows the meth testing was bogus. He knows people were thrown out of their homes when there was no evidence when the contamination occurred or who had caused it.

Bridges and his National colleagues gloated as Paula Bennett put the boot in again and again against beneficiaries and state house tenants on the meth issue.

We are inviting New Zealanders to condemn Bridges rather than condemn state house tenants caught up in National’s cruel campaign.

Independent inquiry into the meth-testing industry and Mike Sabin’s role in it

Bridges should be calling for an independent inquiry into the meth-testing industry which drove the hysteria about meth contamination.

Bridges colleague Mike Sabin, former policeman and former National MP, was at the heart of the moral panic over meth.

Before he entered Parliament as an MP in 2011, Sabin was a policeman and founded an anti-methamphetamine company called MethCon.

It was an appropriate name for the company and the campaign Sabin ran in the National Party to drum up hysteria around methamphetamine.

As a result of Sabin’s campaign and National’s joy in attacking state house tenants and beneficiaries Housing New Zealand wasted over $100 million on meth testing and remediation of contaminated homes.

How much of the $100 million wasted went through MethCon?

It was an industry out of control. I have been told by an industry insider that companies would deliberately test polyurethaned surfaces because they would always give elevated meth results.

There must be an inquiry into this unregulated, cowboy industry. We need to know how we came to waste over $100 million in taxpayer money.

John Minto

Convenor

State Housing Action Network

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