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The Labour Party leadership has become involved in an embarrassing dispute with its wealthiest backer, expatriate multimillionaire Owen Glenn, after he claimed that Prime Minister Helen Clark tried to lure him into politics to become Transport Minister.
Helen Clark said yesterday: "It never happened."
Mr Glenn also suggested in an interview that his $500,000 donation to Labour before the 2005 election was prompted by concerns about the Exclusive Brethren campaign against Labour and the Greens.
But Labour Party president Mike Williams said that was not correct: "Owen is confused about the timing."
Mr Glenn also revealed that he lent the Labour Party money after the election to employ fundraisers which had since been repaid.
Mr Williams confirmed the loan but said it was made last year and therefore its worth as a donation would be included in the declarations that had to be made to the Electoral Commission by April 30 this year.
Mr Glenn and Helen Clark will be able next week to personally discuss their differences over his recollections because she will be opening a new building named after him at Auckland University Business School.
Mr Glenn, who lives in Monaco, donated $7.5 million to the Business School. He made his fortune in international freight. He was made an officer of the NZ Order of Merit for services to business and the community.
He is visiting New Zealand for the opening and was reported yesterday as telling the Dominion Post that Helen Clark had tried to lure him back and into the Labour Cabinet.
She had suggested that with his background, he would be a sitter for the transport portfolio. He said he was not convinced because with all the major transport assets sold off to private owners, there would have been little for him to do.
He told the Dominion Post he had made the decision to donate to Labour while on his yacht in the Caribbean.
"There was a little bit of controversy to do with some church that had done something," he said in reference to the Brethren's $1.2m campaign to support the election of National.
Mr Glenn did not return calls by the Herald and Helen Clark issued only her short denial through a spokeswoman.
