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Besieged minister Damien O'Connor texted his offer to resign his Corrections portfolio over the parliamentary rugby tour controversy, but was turned down by Prime Minister Helen Clark, he said today.
Speaking to reporters at Auckland Airport this morning, the Corrections Minister said in hindsight his decision to take a suspended prison staffer on the tour to France had been a bad call.
His spokesperson said Mr O'Connor sent Miss Clark a text from Hong Kong about 10pm on Monday offering to resign the Corrections porfolio.
However, the Prime Minister texted back declining his offer.
"I declined to accept it - as I said yesterday I will be addressing all these issues at a later point," Miss Clark today told reporters.
Miss Clark said she was not surprised to get Mr O'Connor's text message rather than a call.
"I wasn't surprised at all because we try to communicate around busy programmes and travel schedules," she said.
"He is a decent person, that was the decent thing to do but I didn't accept it."
She replied by text because it was late and she thought he was on a flight by then.
Asked what she wrote Miss Clark said: "That's between him and me."
Further discussions would depend on schedules.
"But really this issue is going to be addressed in the future."
Mr O'Connor's judgment is under question after he took the suspended officer on the rugby tour - apparently seeing no problem because he had handed over responsibility for dealing with the suspension to another minister.
But Helen Clark branded the move "a bad call" and yesterday she said it would be taken into account when she reshuffles her Cabinet in coming weeks. "I'm always irritated when ministers cause problems that are needless.
"And if advice had been sought on this one, then there would have been a different outcome at a much earlier stage."
Mr O'Connor should either have made sure the suspended prison officer was not in the team, or not gone on the tour himself, she suggested.
But the Prime Minister added that she did not think the incident in itself was a "hanging offence".
"It's something that shouldn't have happened," she said.
There is now a growing expectation that the Cabinet reshuffle will be a major one. Other ministers tipped to be demoted as Labour fights to get closer to National in the polls include Mark Burton, with new blood likely to enter in the form of Shane Jones and Maryan Street.
Helen Clark is giving little away about when she will make the changes.
But her options are limited by a series of looming events, including a trip abroad that starts late this month and ends in October's second week.
There is little doubt the Prime Minister will want to take her new line-up into the Labour Party's annual conference in the first weekend of November, so ministers are likely to face a wait of seven weeks at the most before they know their fate. Helen Clark could choose to bring forward the reshuffle to avoid Mr O'Connor facing weeks of questioning in Parliament in his role as Corrections Minister - a portfolio he is likely to lose, though she suggested tongue-in-cheek that holding on to it was itself a punishment.
If the Prime Minister opts for an early move, then the reshuffle could be as close as two weeks away.
Mr O'Connor has not spoken to his leader yet but is expected to talk with her when he arrives in Wellington. He has said that in hindsight there may have been a perceived conflict of interest in taking the suspended officer, Jim Morgan, on the rugby tour.
The parliamentary rugby team has relatively loose eligibility rules which allow the spouses and siblings of Parliament's staff to play alongside MPs and ministers.
Mr Morgan, employed at Rimutaka Prison, has played in the team for several years but it appears most of his teammates did not know he was suspended when he joined the effort to help New Zealand win the parliamentary equivalent of the Rugby World Cup in France last week.
Senior National MP Murray McCully, who co-captains the team alongside Mr O'Connor, said last night he had no idea of the suspension.
"I didn't even know he worked for the Corrections Department.He is a guy who is an occasional player, in quite a big squad available for the parliamentary team."
Mr McCully said Mr O'Connor had not consulted him about whether taking Mr Morgan was a good idea, and it was totally within the pair's capacity to decide the player could not travel with the team.
He said the rugby team was a "fine institution" and one of the few things that brought MPs together from across the spectrum.
