Serious damage control underway in Labour

by Cameron Slater on March 15, 2018 at 8:00am

Labour have moved to limit the damage to the party and the government by deploying the playbook used in the McCarten slave-Labour matter.

That is, they are saying the party wasn’t responsible for this, it was those silly young children in Young Labour. This was signalled yesterday morning by The World’s Greatest Sysop on The Standard.

That was at 10:37am and, what do you know, in the afternoon that is precisely what they attempted to do.

So what Jacinda Ardern is finally admitting is that youth aren’t able to make adult decisions, despite the party wanting to lower the voting age to 16. But her answer about the running of the event, that it was Young Labour, doesn’t ring true.

That is because Andrew Kirton, who lives in Wellington, was posing in photos at the camp and with Jacinda Ardern at the camp. There he is, bottom left, at the camp.

Andrew Kirton, bottom left

It doesn’t ring true that Young Labour were running this camp when Andrew Kirton was there and authorised the Young Labour photo, when Tamati Coffey was there, when Liz Craig was there. On top of that, the organiser is in her twenties and also, my sources say, there were two staffers from parliament there as well. Is Jacinda Ardern really saying Young Labour ran the event when the General Secretary is clearly in attendance? Is she really going to run that line? The facts don’t match up with her claims.

Jacinda Ardern is spinning like a top. Her tales don’t ring true; her body language gives it all away.

Labour have lied about this from the get go, they’ve attempted a cover-up and they’ve taken over a month to deal with this.

Jacinda Ardern has professed she didn’t know a thing. Labour went on for years attacking John Key for nothings. They attacked Chris Bishop. They attacked John Key for the ponytail incident. Now they are facing a much, much worse situation with serious crimes alleged.

Labour are displaying all the same traits of the Catholic Church. Lie, obfuscate, deny and victim blame. They victim-blamed with Darren Hughes, Mike Williams intimated there were historic offences, and the intern slave-Labour scam all show that Labour have an appalling history and probably a systemic issue with regards to sexual offending.

 

-RadioNZ,

A culture of abuse and denial is being revealed inside Labour

by Cameron Slater on March 14, 2018 at 9:00am

The Labour party have a major scandal on their hands now.

Firstly, the news broke on Monday about four alleged sexual assaults at a Young Labour camp opened by the Prime Minister. At least one MP was in attendance, and at least two staffers from the Labour’s whips office.

Then news started to drip-feed out on Twitter about other incidents:

Labour’s Andrew Kirton tells @reporter__ryan on @RadioLIVENZ they are investigating another assault at a different Labour event

 

and;

And there are more. Some MPs will be very squeamish right now, especially on the historic events.

What is clear here, though, is that there appears to be a systemic culture of abuse and denial within Labour. I certainly know of many activities that have gone on at camps past, some of which involved MPs, sitting and past. It also makes one of Ian Wishart’s storiesfrom the last Labour government under Clark now ring true.

Labour’s ham-fisted and, frankly, tone deaf methods of dealing with this smacks of a cover-up and denial that they have an issue inside the party.

It makes all their slavering over Key’s ponytail pulling and Chris Bishop’s Snapchatting look self-serving. All the while they’ve been sitting on their own nasty scandal that may well see people jailed for serious crimes.

 

-Twitter

The definitive timeline of Labour’s sex scandal

by Cameron Slater on March 14, 2018 at 9:30am

Labour MP Liz Craig at the Summer Camp drinking session

A reader has researched Labour’s sex scandal and produced what can only be described as the definitive timeline of the sex scandal:

Date   Event Day #
9/02/18   Day 1 of Young Labour Summer Camp D-Day -1
9/02/18 Labour Prime Minister Jacinda Adern speaks to Summer Camp
Labour MP, Peeni Henara Minister of Youth Affairs attends Summer Camp and speaks
10/02/18 Day 2 of Young Labour Summer Camp D-Day
10/02/18 Labour MP Tamati Coffey attends Summer Camp and speaks on Maori development
10/02/18 Dr Sarb Johal attends Summer Camp and speaks to on mental health
10/02/18 Labour’s Coromandel Spokesman, Nathaniel Blomfield attends Summer Camp
Large-scale drinking session occurs with a “mountain” of alcohol including rum, vodka, cider and an array of RTDs.  Many people drinking at this session including a 15-year-old child.

 

Drinking session occurs attended by Labour MP Liz Craig
10/02/18 Camp Supervisor, Young Labour’s Senior Executive Secretary, Tess Macintyre goes to bed at 2100
10/02/18 Twilight ends at Waihi 2155
10/02/18 2 male and 2 female 16-year-old children sexually assaulted by having a person’s hands stuck down their pants at Young Labour Summer Camp.
11/02/18 Day 3 of Young Labour Summer Camp D-Day +1
NZME runs story on Chris Bishop about a mother upset at him for messaging her daughter and other minors.
All four victims interviewed by organisers of event, Young Labour, and asked what support could they provide.
11/02/18 First leak of assault into public sphere.
11/02/18 Alleged 20-year-old offender sent home from camp.
11/02/18 Labour’s spokeswoman for Rotorua issues, MP Angie Warren-Clark gives speech on feminism at Summer Camp
11/02/18 Manager of the Tauranga Women’s Refuge speaks to Summer Camp
11/02/18 Decision made based on the Labour party’s and Young Labour’s internal process for dealing with these sort of incidents not to advise victims’ parents.
12/02/18 Day 4 of Young Labour Summer Camp D-Day +2
13/02/18 D-Day +3
14/02/18 Labour General Secretary Andrew Kirton advised of Incident. Advised Young Labour to get back in contact with victims and if they wanted any support. This was done via email after which two victims advised that they would like further contact and two victims did not respond to the email. D-Day +4
14/02/18 Labour party President Nigel Howarth and Labour Senior Vice President Beth Houston also made aware of incident.
15/02/18 D-Day +5
16/02/18 D-Day +6
17/02/18 D-Day +7
18/02/18 D-Day +8
19/02/18 D-Day +9
20/02/18 D-Day +10
21/02/18 D-Day +11
22/02/18 D-Day +12
23/02/18 D-Day +13
24/02/18 D-Day +14
25/02/18 D-Day +15
26/02/18 D-Day +16
27/02/18 D-Day +17
28/02/18 D-Day +18
1/03/18 D-Day +19
2/03/18 D-Day +20
3/03/18 D-Day +21
4/03/18 Cabinet Minister Megan Woods contacted via Facebook by victim who was unhappy that there had been no response from Young Labour following their response to the 14/02/2018 email. Cabinet Minister advises Andrew Kirkton. D-Day +22
4/03/18 Cabinet Minister Megan Woods saw message on Facebookreporting incident and contacted poster to obtain more details and then contacted Andrew Kirkton.
5/03/18 Andrew Kirkton contacts Wellington support and counselling services Help for the first time. D-Day +23
6/03/18 D-Day +24
7/03/18 D-Day +25
8/03/18 D-Day +26
9/03/18 D-Day +27
10/03/18 Labour offer professional services to victims. D-Day +28
10/03/18 Counselling and support services offered to alleged offender.
11/03/18 D-Day +29
12/03/18 First article of incident appears in media. D-Day +30
12/03/18 Labour Prime Minister advised of incident by media.
13/03/18 Andrew Kirton reveals Labour are also investigating a similar incident from a previous Labour event. D-Day +31
Labour PM Jacinda Adern advises “Labour Party General Secretary Andrew Kirton ‘absolutely has my backing’ and should not resign over the incident.”
 14/03/18 Media publish reports that one of the victims has laid a complaint with police. D-Day +32
 • Prime Minister advised of incident by media.
Former Labour Party President, Mike Williams Advises the AM Show that he dealt with a similar case while in charge, however, could not provide details as it had gone to court and all details were suppressed.
Labour party announces that they are suspending all scheduled events by their Young Labour wing.
 •  Labour party announces that alcohol will no longer be allowed at any future event where children younger than 18 yrs will be present.
 •  Labour MP Liz Craig admits to being present at Labour Summer Camp, however, she was asleep when the assaults took place and had only stayed overnight as she couldn’t get a flight home on the Saturday after presenting at the camp. Labour MP Liz Craig also states, “On the Saturday evening I attended a quiz event and went to bed early once this had finished…While alcohol was present, I understood the organising committee had put in place measures to ensure those under the age of 18 were not drinking, and that organising committee members had been designated to oversee the evening’s events.”
 •  Labour PM Jainda Ardern acknowledges that her Instagram page still contains photos from the event and promises to take these photos down immediately.
 •  Labour PM Jacinda Ardern and Labour party President front to media and during press event advise neither Labour party President Nigel Haworth or the party’s general secretary Andrew Kirton will be resigning despite how the allegations were handled in the days and weeks after the camp.

This was always going to come out… just days after the event people were tweeting.

Let’s not forget the looming sex scandal coming soon from the Labour camp. Will make Darren Hughes look like a fairy tale …….
Hang on to your steak and cheese peeps !!!

 

As more events happen we will add to this in subsequent posts. Wait until the resignations start.

 

-Tipline

A tale of two crimes in Labour

by Cameron Slater on March 14, 2018 at 10:30am

 

Credit: Luke

The Labour party are embroiled in the midst of a sex scandal, kicked off by allegations of sexual assault against four teenagers at a recent Young Labour Summer Camp.

So far the incidents have not been referred to police but, in the past, for crimes much less serious, Labour did refer people to the police.

Labour Party member and former Parliamentary staffer Sonny Thomas has admitted taking $4183.90 from his boss Phil Twyford and his wife, stealing a cash machine card to withdraw money and racking up food and drink bills in his name.

Thomas, 24, was Mr Twyford’s executive assistant and would buy food for him when he was unable to get his own.

Thomas bought over $877 of food and drink for himself while getting things for Mr Twyford.

He also went into Mr Twyford’s office while he was at meetings and took a credit card.

Using knowledge of Mr Twyford’s personal details and access numbers he guessed his PIN and withdrew $3560 over several months.

Thomas was asked about some extra transactions over the food and drink and said a mistake had been made and paid back $254.

He pleaded guilty to theft and fraudulently obtaining a financial advantage and Wellington District Court judge Michael Turner sentenced him to 250 hours community work and ordered him to pay back the money within a month.

 

So, Sonny Thomas nicked a few grand from Phil Twyford’s expense account and Labour dobbed him into police. That is as it should be.

But, what we have now is a serious crime, sexual assault, and no one has been referred to police. Is this guy special to someone?

It smacks of the cover-up and hurried departure of Darren Hughes after he was accused of crimes involving a teenager. When that happened Labour went all in on victim blaming. The scurrilous rumours that were put about by Labour (some of those MPs are still there, by the way) were disgusting. In the end, they worked. The young bloke was frightened off and left the country. Darren Hughes was allowed to resign quietly from parliament and he too fled the country. He is now residing in the UK, but was recently back in Auckland.

The incident at the Summer Camp has uncanny similarities with the Hughes affair. Leadership professing no knowledge, but senior people were actively working in the background to cover it all up. With Darren Hughes it was Phil Goff and Annette King (Hughes’ landlady) who carried out the cover-up, trying to keep everything quiet for three weeks until Jonathan Marshall flew to Wellington and busted the story wide open.

In this case, senior people AND MPs knew about what went on. They’ve kept it hushed up for three weeks and then it finally broke. In the meantime Labour ran their own hit job against Chris Bishop and now we are at the point where Labour look shifty, secretive and in denial of what appears to be a serious systemic issue with alcohol and young people inside the Labour party. I don’t for a minute believe that Jacinda Ardern didn’t know anything. She gave the game away at her press conference when asked. Her information and actions taken were far too detailed for someone who professed to have just heard about it at the press conference.

It would also seem that if you are just a run-of-the-mill staffer then you get chucked under the bus for theft, but serious sexual assault, for which the penalties can be up to seven years in prison, and the party try to hush it all up.

I think this is going to come down to who the alleged perpetrator was. The way they have been protected so far, at the expense of his victims, suggests they are connected somehow. It will come out. Too many people know who it is.

The role of senior ministers and MPs in all this needs to be further explored. We know Tamati Coffey was there, and we now know Liz Craig was too. Sources have informed me that staff from Labour’s whips office were also in attendance. Newsroom have released a video of drunk young people at the party. Who was in charge? It seems no one was. Who supplied the alcohol? They are in the gun too. And who is the one who started the culture of secrecy and cover-up?

Labour have a serious issue. No one is going to listen to them if this carries on too much longer. Jacinda Ardern’s concerned face and whining aren’t going to cut it. The public will start demanding heads. This is Roast Busters all over again.

 

-Fairfax