Jonathan Milne: PM up to speed on cars - and rugby

Five police officers and a civilian driver are to fight dangerous driving charges, after the Prime Minister's motorcade sped through South Canterbury to get her to the airport in time to watch a Bledisloe Cup rugby test.

The trial begins in Timaru District Court tomorrow.

Registrar: The court calls Miss Clark to the witness stand. Please state your name.

Clark: My name is Helen Elizabeth Clark, civil servant, of Mt Eden.

Registrar: Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Clark: I do.

Prosecutor: Miss Clark, let's cut to the chase. Your motorcade is alleged to have exceeded 140 km/h on the drive from Waimate to Christchurch last year. We have heard from the former mayor of Waimate that your car left town "like a bat out of hell". You must really love your rugby?

Clark: To be entirely honest, I couldn't tell you who was playing or what the score was.

Prosecutor: Is it the speed then? The adrenalin buzz, powering through small hick towns, scattering chickens and other livestock, leaving straw-chewing locals awestruck in your dust?

Clark: Aw shucks, I admit it, I just wanted to be another David Lange - he used to race cars at the Pukekohe circuit. And Don Brash has been clambering into go-carts at Western Springs Stadium. I wanted my own thing - and I thought, why not V8 street racing in Waimate?

Prosecutor: Yet you say you didn't know how fast you were going?

Clark: I was talking to Trade Minister Jim Sutton in the back of the car about tariff reduction negotiations. Let me assure you, time seemed to be moving very slowly.

Prosecutor: Well, Mr Sutton has testified that he knew the cars were exceeding the speed limit. He said he had travelled in motorcades in other countries, on the wrong side of motorways, as fast as the cars could go, so that he had been dead-scared for the pedestrians. Perhaps you thought speeding motorcades were a prime ministerial privilege?

Clark: Or perhaps it's time the taxpayer bought me a private jet.

Prosecutor: Miss Clark, why do you think it is that the drivers of the cars, and even the police officers who were sitting in the passenger seats, are facing charges - yet you are not?

Clark: It is a matter of judgment for the Prime Minister how I use a powerful automobile. By definition, I cannot speed.

Prosecutor: You must be a little bit stressed about the impact on your election campaign of two weeks of evidence from hard-working police officers about how they broke the law on implicit and unspoken prime ministerial direction?

Clark: I don't do stress. I am optimistic voters will return Labour to government. South Canterbury has experienced six years of economic growth and job creation thanks to the number of senior police sent down from Wellington to investigate my motorcade.

Prosecutor: You're speeding ahead in the polls as well, what with writing off all the interest on student loans, and accusing Don Brash of having his foreign policy driven from Washington DC. But isn't it true that was an American car in which you were riding?

Clark: I have very, very, very good friends who are American, but they don't drive the car. My government drives its own foreign policy.

Prosecutor: Nobody else takes the steering wheel?

Clark: I have confidence in my own abilities as a competent and hard-working prime minister - it was me driving the car.

Registrar: The court will adjourn till September 17 for judgment. All rise.


- HERALD ON SUNDAY