The Broadcasting Standards Authority has partially upheld a complaint from Act MP Rodney Hide over a TVNZ item but imposed no costs or punishment.
Mr Hide complained that a TVNZ news item linking him with an investment scam was "unbalanced, inaccurate and unfair".
The authority upheld his complaint over three inaccuracies, but did not uphold his complaints of other inaccuracies or the item's balance and fairness.
People paid as much as $10,000 to attend an investment seminar in Fiji in January 1999 at which Mr Hide spoke.
The Consumers' Institute says New Zealanders have lost millions of dollars through scams linked with such seminars.
Mr Hide's complaint to the authority followed a report on One News on May 15 about an affidavit which said the MP's presence as a speaker at the seminar gave a man and his family the confidence to invest in the scheme.
It was also reported the scheme turned out to be a scam and that the man who swore the affidavit lost $60,000 and his family $400,000.
Mr Hide said he had never endorsed an investment scheme, anywhere.
TVNZ responded that the item was a follow-up to an ongoing story in which Mr Hide had "unwittingly" been used to lend credibility to the seminar and declined to uphold his complaint.
Mr Hide then took his complaint to the authority, which he told TVNZ went ahead with the story, despite being advised by both Mr Hide's lawyer and himself that it was false.
His complaints included:
The presenter's introduction of him as a "self-proclaimed scam-busting MP" was wrong as he had never proclaimed himself to be a "scam buster".
The reporter confused a seminar with an investment scheme, leaving the impression Mr Hide was implicated in investors' losing millions of dollars.
The extract used in the item from his speech in Parliament did not distinguish between speaking at a seminar and endorsing an investment scheme.
Mr Hide had subsequently ascertained the man who swore the affidavit and his family did not hold the MP responsible for losing their money, and that the man had never spoken to a television reporter.
He was not given reasonable opportunity to respond.
In its consideration of the complaint, the authority "carefully examined" phone calls from Mr Hide to the man who swore the affidavit.
"It understands why Mr Hide believes that the [man] has retracted some of his comments, especially those dealing with blame," it said.
"It is also aware that the exchange involved an articulate and confident politician and a person who appeared to be somewhat bewildered by Mr Hide's questioning and whose confusion at times was easy to detect."
Mr Hide had questioned the veracity of the affidavit but the authority concluded it "essentially correctly" recorded the man's account of the events.
The authority found the item inaccurate:
To imply the wider family of the man who swore the affidavit blamed Mr Hide for their loss.
To imply the family had acted that night (May 15) when the affidavit was signed on May 12.
To call Mr Hide a "self-proclaimed" scam buster.
Mr Hide asked that TVNZ be ordered to pay his legal costs of $5000, but the authority did not impose any order.
- NZPA
MP's grumble with TVNZ partly upheld
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