KEY POINTS:
Act leader Rodney Hide yesterday challenged National to put its party weight behind a move to call Monaco-based billionaire Owen Glenn before Parliament's privileges committee.
The committee tonight holds its first hearings, which will be open to the public, in the inquiry into a $100,000 Mr Glenn contributed to the legal bill of New Zealand First leader and Foreign Minister Winston Peters.
It will first hear from Queen's Counsel Stephen Kos on the conventions of payments to barristers. Then it will hear from Mr Peters' lawyer, Brian Henry, and from Mr Peters.
The committee must decide if Mr Glenn's $100,000 was a gift and therefore needed to be declared in the register of MPs' pecuniary interests.
But Mr Hide, who forced the privileges committee hearing, said it was not enough just to hear Mr Peters' side of the story. "It is not going to be cleared up until we hear Owen Glenn's side of the story."
Labour and New Zealand First do not have a majority on the committee.
National, with support from Act, the Greens and the Maori Party, could invite Mr Glenn to give evidence.
Mr Hide also believes the committee should call Baldwin Boyle PR man Steve Fisher, who advised Mr Glenn in emails in February to ensure his public statements were consistent with Mr Peters'. Publication of the emails in the Herald in July triggered the eventual admission that Mr Glenn had made a $100,000 donation.
The emails show Mr Glenn believed he gave to NZ First, contrary to Mr Peters's denials in February.
A week after denouncing the Herald story, Mr Peters said his lawyer told him Mr Glenn had paid $100,000 of his legal bill in 2006 for the legal challenge to the Tauranga result.
Mr Hide said the committee needed to know what Mr Glenn thought he was giving the money for, and if it was discussed with Mr Peters.
Committee chairman Simon Power said last night that Mr Peters and his lawyers had been invited "initially". Nothing was "off the cards."
It would be up to the committee whether to ask anybody else to give evidence.
Mr Peters was the subject of a privileges committee inquiry in 1997 over an altercation between him and John Banks, who was then a National MP.
The finding was that there was not sufficient evidence to prove a contempt of Parliament was committed but that Mr Peters' behaviour had been "unbecoming".
DIFFERENT AGENDAS FOR PRIVILEGES HEARING
LABOUR
To have it finished with as little trouble as possible. To restrict the committee's focus to the question of whether payment of Winston Peters's legal bill by Owen Glenn amounted to a gift under Parliament's rules and therefore should have been declared.
NATIONAL
To minimise aggravation to Winston Peters, as a possible post-election kingmaker. To demonstrate a compelling case for calling Owen Glenn without it looking as though it wants to put Peters through a kangaroo court.
NEW ZEALAND FIRST
To convince the public that the hearing is a waste of time, that Winston Peters is being unfairly persecuted, that not only did he not know who paid his $100,000 legal bill, but that he had no business knowing.
ACT
To make political trouble for Winston Peters. To broaden the committee's interest to other donations, including Bob Jones' donation via the Spencer Trust and secret donations from donors such as the Vela Brothers and Suminovich Fisheries.
