Did anybody else's stomach turn at Winston's behaviour in the House today? Using Parliamentary privilege to accuse someone of paedophilia without a shred of evidence really is plumbing new depths, even for him. Frankly, I'm surprised that his NZFirst colleagues can sit next to him. But then, considering the shit some of them have spread - Enoch Brown and Bill Gudgeon in particular - they seem to go together perfectly.
If Peters has real evidence of either child abuse or the sale of objectionable material (rather than simply material he objects to), then he should pass it to Police. It's that simple. If he is unwilling or unable to do that, then I think its fairly clear that he is, as Rodney Hide put it, "a homophobic member of Parliament attack[ing] someone simply because that person happens to be a friend of an MP".
8 comments:
Yes it was truly appalling. Not the first or probably the last time he has done this.
Posted by David Farrar : 3/10/2005 07:42:00 AM
As far as the Kiwi blogisphere goes, I think Winston's turned everybody's stomach... While my sympathies go out to Jim Peron and his partner, this just points out a larger problem with parliamentary privilege. Surely, it was never meant to be an open licence to libel without cost or consequence?
Posted by Anonymous : 3/10/2005 09:28:00 AM
I note that the NZ First website does not reproduce Winstone's allegations, nor did "it" repeat them on Close Up last night after he abused parliamentary privilege.
As a Gaynz.Com columnist, I have no hesitation in standing by my colleague. Jim is not a paedophile.
Craig Young
Posted by Anonymous : 3/10/2005 09:46:00 AM
Craig: it was never meant to be, but a consequence of granting MPs absolute freedom of speech so they can freely discuss any issue without fear is that they can also smear people without penalty.
I think the only way to limit this is at the ballot box. Unfortunately, Winston seems to have a horde of admiring fans and lovestruck pensioners, who seem to approve of his antics.
Posted by Idiot/Savant : 3/10/2005 10:24:00 AM
One can but hope that the Tauranga voters’ stomach are sufficiently turned to throw him out of parliament in September, along with his NZF black horde, but I suspect at least Herald “columnist” Sandra Paterson will be pleased with his performance.
Posted by Hans Versluys : 3/10/2005 10:38:00 AM
totally agree with you. what a slimeball that creepy little man luigi is.
Posted by gazzadelsud : 3/10/2005 07:17:00 PM
Peron did at one point in America, stock NAMBLA's newsletter, which indicates that he finds the content acceptable.
Does that mean he should get the Winston treatment? Nope. But then neither do I like that he felt that it was ok to allow NAMBLA material in his place of work.
Posted by Muerk : 3/10/2005 11:32:00 PM
One could say that the problem is that the full transcript (unedited) is available.
parlimntary privilidge allows free debate in parliment and it seems very important that winston is able to make such an accusation a(although one would hope he would restrict it to politically relevant issues).
But Winstons "slander" (justified or not) of this man would either be not worth his time (if it is nonsense) or would have limited effect on Peron if it was not publicied in the media.
If you create a system that encourages certain behaviour you can hardly blame the people you have trained for doing exactly what your system trains them to do.
Posted by Genius : 3/11/2005 12:18:00 AM
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