John Armstrong: The year of Orewa and the foreshore

Remember Orewa? Who could forget. Yet go back to the speech that set the political year alight and you will struggle to find a pithy, memorable quote that makes the speech stand out as a powerful piece of political oratory.

Still, Don Brash did utter by far the most unforgettable quote of 2004 - but never intended it to become public. He has never fessed up to making his notorious "gone by lunchtime" remark, but has never denied saying it either.

For its accuracy, we have to rely on an anonymous Ministry of Foreign Affairs official who took notes at Dr Brash's meeting with some visiting American senators.

Regardless, the remark has entered the political lexicon. Its only competition is the Prime Minister finding Shrek the sheep "good company" - her way of saying the foreshore and seabed hikoi was not.

But you be the judge. Here are some of the more memorable quotes which tell the story of a pretty torrid political year:

Orewa and beyond

* "Let me be blunt. Over the last 20 years, the treaty has been wrenched out of its 1840s context and become the plaything of those who would divide New Zealanders." - Don Brash hits the spot with THAT speech.

* "The main thing on which we agree is that we both like fish and chips." - Brash dismisses suggestions his Orewa speech bore similarities to language used by former fish-and-chip shop owner and One Nation leader Pauline Hanson.

* "A stuffy sort of colonial tea planter trying to put native servants in their place." - Winston Peters' opinion of the National leader's speech.

* "Not a bad shot." - Brash's instinctive reaction to being hit in the face by a lump of mud at Waitangi.

* "My wife's from Singapore." - Brash's line in small talk at social functions, as revealed on the TVNZ documentary Hurricane Brash.

* "I say: bring it on." - Helen Clark borrows from US presidential hopeful John Kerry to warn Brash he has a fight on his hands.

* "I regard myself as an indigenous New Zealander - I come from Wainuiomata." - Race Relations Minister Trevor Mallard tries to take the steam out of the race debate by declaring Maori and Pakeha are both indigenous to New Zealand.

* "It is like putting a team of burglars in charge of security at a bank." - Peters takes a dim view of Helen Clark's special parliamentary committee examining the role of the Treaty of Waitangi. 

* "It is one thing to steal a man's horse, but it is quite something else to stay on its back as one is riding out of town." - Peters lords it over Brash after NZ First secured concessions from Labour on the foreshore law.

* "More and more as the year has gone on, National has resembled a kind of eunuch with a bunch of flowers ... it has a great approach, but no capacity to follow through when it comes to the crucial moment." - Michael Cullen scathingly sums up the National's very up-and-down year.

I wish I hadn't said that

* "In future contributions to this House, would it be all right for me to refer to Mr Tamihere as 'the black fella'?" - National's Gerry Brownlee gets irate in Parliament after Labour's John Tamihere called him the "big fella".

* "Irresponsible tart." - Cabinet Minister Ruth Dyson's mutters an under-the-breath insult about National's Katherine Rich during a select committee meeting. The remark was picked up by a TVNZ microphone.

* "Without reservation, we will support our close allies, Australia, the United States and Britain, when and wheresoever our commitment is called on." - National's Simon Power shoots himself in the foot by inadvertently declaring New Zealand should blindly follow its traditional allies into war. He was subsequently reshuffled out of the shadow defence portfolio.

* " ... I'm not ruling out thinking about it if it became essential." - Act's Stephen Franks thinking aloud about how he might join National if his party looks doomed.

I wish I hadn't done that

* "Do you think I'd compromise my career for a meal of fish?" - Winston Peters scoffs at TVNZ claims he accepted a free dinner at Auckland's Kermadec Restaurant as payoff from Peter Simunovich, the man at the centre of the parliamentary inquiry into scampi quota.

* "I did have an affair. That's absolutely correct, and I acknowledge that. It's not something I'm proud of." - Brash beats a hasty retreat after accusing the Prime Minister of "indifference to the institution of marriage".

* "I didn't give any instructions to drive fast." - Clark speeds away from any suggestion she ordered her motorcade to go like a bat out of hell through the South Canterbury countryside.

Down and out

* "I would rather die than be an immigration consultant." - Former immigration minister Lianne Dalziel rules out one career option after being sacked from the Cabinet.

* "I have resigned from Cabinet today because I did change my mind and accept a golden handshake, and I did not tell my Prime Minister. Some see that as hypocrisy, and I will do my time." - John Tamihere tells Parliament why he had to lose his ministerial status.

* "You can only water-blast the house so much and mow the lawns so often." - Tamihere itches to return to the parliamentary fray.

* "I am going to take a few weeks to reflect on my future." - Donna Awatere Huata's immediate reaction after the Supreme Court ruled that Act could have her thrown out of Parliament. She was ejected the next day.

* "It's a good opportunity to develop a further skill-set, and, to be honest, I'm quite looking forward to it." - Simon Power puts the best possible gloss on his demotion to chief whip.

U-turn if you want to

* "A new balance has to be found. I hear what people are saying. I read what they are saying. I think there are obviously concerns that need to be addressed and they will be addressed. So you can expect some ongoing response and initiatives." - Clark flags a host of Government u-turns over Maori policy.

* "The Cullen Fund is nothing more than financial smoke and mirrors." - Don Brash slags Labour's superannuation fund which he has subsequently endorsed.

* "If the National Party was in government today, we would get rid of the nuclear propulsion section today - by lunchtime, even." - A Foreign Affairs official's record of what Don Brash purportedly told a bunch of American politicians about repealing the anti-nuclear law.

Hikoi comes to town

* "The haters and wreckers." - Clark's opinion of the organisers of the foreshore hikoi.

* "I thought Shrek was good company." - Clark explains why she was happy to meet a merino sheep on Parliament's forecourt, but not the hikoi.

* "The one thing we have in common with Shrek is that we were both fleeced." - Tariana Turia laments the passage of the foreshore law.

* "My message to my colleagues is 'If you want to get on board for the ride, get on', because this train is moving." - Clark orders her rebellious Maori MPs into line.

* "At the end of the day it came down to a question of my integrity." - Turia finally quits the Labour Party.

Money Matters

* "This Government was not elected to slash the incomes of the poor." - Michael Cullen finally delivers a true "Labour" Budget after five years as finance minister and dollops out the cash to working families.

* "It is a blank cheque. It is for the lifetime support of Ahmed Zaoui, Mrs Zaoui, Uncle and Auntie Zaoui, Grandpa Zaoui, and all the other friends, relations, and bogus asylum-seekers, refugees, and flotsam that have arrived here in the past four years." - Peters' take on the Budget.

* "He has a good mind and is a good deal more pragmatic than his leader who is as dry as the dry valleys of Antarctica." - Cullen welcomes John Key's appointment as National's finance spokesman.

Civil Disunion

* "I did not choose my sexuality; no one does. It was in me from when the genetic strands started to gather in my mother's womb." - Gay MP Tim Barnett makes an impassioned plea to Parliament to pass the Civil Union Bill.

* "This bill is an abomination to all mankind." - NZ First's Bill Gudgeon sees things differently.

* "I cannot believe that two males, or two females, can have the same degree of enjoyment of life as a man and a woman can." - NZ First's Dail Jones writes his own version of the Kinsey Report.

* "This is the hard sell of the homosexual community. This is a recruitment drive." - National MP Brian Connell goes right over the top.

* "I am coming out of the closet. I am coming out of the closet to declare that I am a proud Kiwi male." - John Tamihere speaks up for red-blooded heterosexual men as a counterweight to Labour's supposed political correctness.

* "I hope you have a gay Christmas. Don't take the fairy off the top of the tree." - Rodney Hide lampoons United Future's Christian MPs over their opposition to the Civil Union Bill.

And the mice will play

* "There will be no worm to save you this time, Mr Dunne. Lapdogs and worms are not a good combination." - Peters accuses United Future's leader of too often being the Government's poodle.

* "If I had known how nice everyone was going to be, I would have retired more often." - Richard Prebble steps down as Act's leader after eight years.

* "They can hide, but they still can't run." - Peters on Rodney Hide's victory in Act's leadership ballot.

* "The corpse is virtually beyond resuscitation." - United Future's Peter Dunne gives his diagnosis on Act's future.

* "I've always viewed Peter Dunne's party as a personality cult looking for a personality." - Rodney Hide gets his own back.