Lee's notable oratory crowned stormy career

By AUDREY YOUNG

It's a pity Sandra Lee left it so long to call it a day.

If she had announced it last week, we might have been treated to a great valedictory speech, a proper full-stop on a nine-year parliamentary career.

At her best, and sometimes in her darkest political moments, she has shown a capacity for spine-tingling oratory that is rare enough among women, let alone in Parliament.

She braved the hostility of West Coast protesters outside Parliament last year to explain her veto as Conservation Minister on a mine expansion.

By the end, she was respectfully thanked. Jim Anderton thought he'd try too, and was heckled off.

Her most memorable speech recently had no such tingles. In fact it was difficult to understand a single word of it.

She got a case of the giggles during a parliamentary speech on the Land Transfer and Cadastral Survey Bill - because it was called the Land Transfer and Cadastral Survey Bill. The more she laughed, the more others laughed at her, and the more she was paralysed by laughter.

It was a lighter moment in what has been a career full of serious trouble, no more so than the past year in the thick of the Alliance's demise.

Sandra Lee, as deputy leader and leader of Mana Motuhake, played a crucial role.

If she had made her decision to retire last year, the Alliance might not have fallen into the destructive tail-spin that led to its split.

She was deposed as Mana Motuhake leader by Willie Jackson in a coup a year ago. It was the first important event around which fatal factions took sides.

Sandra Lee continued to hum and haa about whether she would stand again or even stay on as Alliance deputy.

Hardliner Laila Harre had the numbers to beat Jim Anderton's favourite, Matt Robson, to the deputy's job.

Had she secured the job, she might also have secured the peace of the left who believed Alliance MPs had gone soft.

Sandra Lee was dissuaded from vacating the deputy's post because Laila Harre had the numbers. She was guaranteed a place back in Cabinet, one which will now go to Mr Robson.

Sandra Lee is already being tipped for a future role, possibly as New Zealand's representative on the International Whaling Commission to replace retiring rep Jim McLay.

Helen Clark has a big soft spot for Sandra Lee and not just because she has what every Prime Minister needs - enthusiasm for local government.

They formed a personal bond in 1998 when Sandra Lee was instrumental in healing the rift between Helen Clark and Jim Anderton that allowed their parties to forge a truce.

In 1993, she ousted then Labour MP Richard Prebble from Auckland Central, won by Judith Tizard in 1996.

Her career has been peppered with micro-scandals.

She began her ministerial career amid controversy about her press secretary driving without a licence in her boss' car.

Her former electorate agent has taken a case to the employment tribunal alleging he lost his job to her "whanau daughter".

One of her advisers, Anaru Vercoe, left his terminally ill wife for the minister, a relationship that met some disapproval among Mana Motuhake members.

The police were called to Sandra Lee's ministerial house last year after a dispute between Mr Vercoe and Sandra Lee's private secretary at the time, Suzanne Corbett, who was living there.

Sandra Lee was rolled as Mana Motuhake leader two days later.

As a child, Sandra Lee's temperament earned her the nickname "Stormy". She remained true to it.

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