Prime Minister Helen Clark resorted to an attack on the actions of former Police Commissioner Peter Doone as she faced fresh pressure over what she said to a Sunday newspaper days before he resigned in disgrace.
She was forced on to the defensive when previously confidential briefs of evidence from herself, the reporter concerned and the editor were released yesterday by Act and National.
In her brief of evidence, she accepted that she told the reporter "you're not wrong" when he asked her about Mr Doone having said "that won't be necessary" to a constable approaching his partner with a breath tester device.
Helen Clark's evidence was prepared last month for a now-aborted defamation suit taken by Mr Doone against the Sunday Star Times, after it apologised for using the phrase "that won't be necessary".
He says he will now sue Helen Clark.
"I believe it is time Mr Doone took responsibility for his own demise," Helen Clark said yesterday at her post-Cabinet press conference.
"It was he, the Commissioner of Police, charged with upholding the law, who intervened when his partner's car was stopped, when she was driving without lights and he knew that she had consumed alcohol."
Helen Clark also quoted from Mr Doone's statement at the time he resigned: "I have made this decision on my own for reasons which I believe are right and I have made it independently. I decided the job was bigger than me. I do not regard myself as being forced out."
The police report on the incident says Mr Doone told the constable "we'll be on our way", "or words to that effect".
But it adds that Mr Doone disputes that was said.
Yesterday Helen Clark repeated her assertion from last week that she was certain she had told the reporter that what was claimed to have been said by Mr Doone was contested.
But she said she had been referring to the "substance" of what the reporter was telling her about Mr Doone's intervention, not to the precise words he might have used, when she said "you're not wrong."
"I was never focusing on those precise words.
"The substance of the story was never wrong. The substance of the story was that Mr Doone got out of the car which had been been driven by his partner who had had some drinks. The lights were off and he spoke to a young constable in a way which prevented the law from taking its course.
"The exact words he uttered were never the issue," Helen Clark said, "nor in most people's minds would the words Mr Doone objects to be interpreted as any more damaging than saying 'we'll be on our way then'."
Act leader Rodney Hide claims Helen Clark acted in an underhand and dishonest way.
She had two official reports in front of her and confirmed that something had been said that wasn't.
Mr Hide yesterday disputed the suggestion that there was little difference between a commissioner having said "we'll be on our way" and "that won't be necessary".
"Prime Minister Helen Clark has been both evasive and misleading in answering questions from the media and in Parliament," he said.
National leader Don Brash said the documents showed Helen Clark to have acted in an unsavoury manner and that without her confirmation and encouragement, the newspaper would not have run the story.
Helen Clark took issue with a statement to staff by Fairfax, publishers of the Sunday Star Times, which denied it had "outed" her as a confidential source and apparently implied she had volunteered to give evidence in Mr Doone's defamation suit against the newspaper.
Helen Clark said she agreed to provide a brief of evidence only because she had been threatened with a subpoena. "Not only did I not volunteer to take part, they were advised by my lawyer that I did not wish to be involved in the case."
She also ridiculed claims apparently made in the internal memo that she had the option of giving secret evidence in the Doone defamation case.
Clark v Doone
THE PROSECUTION
Helen Clark misled the Sunday Star-Times when it asked her to verify claims that Mr Doone had told a constable carrying a breath-tester machine, "That won't be necessary".
The newspaper telephoned her five times - three times before the story appeared and twice afterwards. The Prime Minister told the Star-Times it would be vindicated.
There is a lot of difference between the commissioner telling a new constable "I'll be on my way" and "That won't be necessary," the latter being more of an order.
Helen Clark undermined the Cabinet process by leaking confidential Cabinet information and telling the newspaper off the record that she wanted Mr Doone to "fall on his sword".
If it weren't for the PM's "verification," the newspaper would not have printed the story and Mr Doone may not have resigned.
THE DEFENCE
The words "That won't be necessary" were not in the two official reports on the incident which the PM had, so she could not have verified that the specific words had been used.
Helen Clark does not recall being specifically asked if those words were used, but said Mr Doone had contested what he was alleged to have said.
When she "verified" the story, she was referring to the substance of the matter: that Mr Doone's intervention had inhibited a constable with a sniffer from breath-testing the driver.
The words "We'll be on our way" are no less damaging than the words the newspaper printed, "That won't be necessary", when used by a commissioner to a constable.
Mr Doone reached a settlement before he was fired; the Cabinet had lost confidence in him because of his actions, not the specifics of what was said.
PM on the back foot over Doone
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