Fraser drops a few bombs

Ian Fraser

A superfluous chief executive turning on something akin to a sewage pump - that was how select committee chairman Shane Jones described Ian Fraser's incendiary account of events at the parliamentary inquiry into TVNZ.

Mr Fraser yesterday got his much-awaited - at least by the public and Opposition MPs - chance to explain why he resigned as TVNZ chief executive in October.

For an hour he told a compelling story of the "irretrievable" breakdown in relationships between the management and the TVNZ board, of the alleged board-initiated undermining of his and Bill Ralston's positions, and of the fading "lustre" of Judy Bailey.

For board chairman Craig Boyce, who was sitting behind Mr Fraser in the select committee room, it would have indeed felt like Mr Fraser had turned on a sewage pump and pointed it in his direction.

After the meeting Mr Jones said Mr Fraser had cut a "rather lonely, tragic figure" in making his claims.

"Mr Fraser, like an aged Lancaster bomber, dropped a few bombs."

The outgoing chief executive's account centred on what he termed the "trigger events" for his resignation. Key to this was the public spectacle last December over Judy Bailey's pay increase.

* Fraser on the Judy Bailey pay saga:
Mr Fraser said Bailey's desired pay increase - a doubling of her salary to $800,000 - was hotly debated by the board and management.

Eventually he was authorised to offer Bailey $800,000 for a one-year contract.

But Mr Fraser says that two days after he made the offer and Bailey accepted, he was rung by a board member and Mr Boyce who told him to withdraw the offer.

"I said I would not withdraw the offer, on two grounds. One that it was a matter or honour and two that since the offer had been made a contract existed and nothing would be gained from withdrawing the offer.

"The results of that chain of events were, one that JB's brand value, which was important to her and crucial to TVNZ, took an irretrievable blow, and we measured it. It corroded the relationship between the board and management, again in my view, almost irretrievably, and certainly from my point of view irretrievably."

Mr Boyce disagrees with Mr Fraser, saying he did not instruct Mr Fraser to withdraw the offer, only to make a counter-offer of $500,000 a year for three years.


IN HIS WORDS


* On alleged board interference in TVNZ management:
"I found myself being faced on a reasonably frequent basis with requests or demands for information that I believe were not the business of board members and should not properly be provided."

* On leaks from the board:
"That media buzz which I believe can only have come from a source or sources on the board was aimed at, I believe, destabilising me. And I have to say it had some effect."

* On his job:
"The job we have to do is a very difficult job. I characterised it last week as being not mission impossible, but certainly being mission very difficult."

* On whether he considered resigning over Bailey's pay:
"I wasn't thinking about suicide, I was really thinking more about homicide."

* On giving Bailey a one-year contract:
"It was going to be time to move her along. She had been the presenter of One News for a decade. Our sense was that we were probably moving towards a closure with Judy."

Sue Kedgley: "The end of her shelf life?"

Fraser: "Yes. Mr [Paul] Holmes talked about the issue of whether he was in the summer of his career and I think that in Judy's case the judgment we made was probably that she was in the autumn of her career ... we wanted the flexibility to effect a closure. We had research on Judy that showed that although she was clearly the pre-eminent news presenter, that some of the lustre had fallen away."