Talk to officials, says Clark, on GE corn claims

11.45

Prime Minister Helen Clark today offered opposition parties and media access to official advice as she sought to calm fears that genetically engineered (GE) corn has been grown in New Zealand.

Activist-author Nicky Hager yesterday said in his book Seeds of Distrust that GE-contaminated corn was planted in Hawke's Bay, Gisborne and Marlborough.

Both Hager and the Green Party claimed a massive cover-up, and party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons called for tests on land where the GE corn was said to have grown to ensure no contamination had occurred.

Today, Miss Clark sought to reassure the public saying: "I can state categorically that the tests confirmed there was no evidence there was GE contamination".

"Every inquiry we have made of officials confirms there was no positive tests. What it's important to note is that in order to conclude there might be GE presence you have to have positive tests across two gene sequences. That did not occur in any test."

Ministers had said the crops would be pulled out if there was any evidence of GE contamination, she said.

"Had it happened, had there been any evidence that it happened, those plants, those seeds, would all have been destroyed."

She repeatedly told National Radio today that officials' advice was there was no evidence of GE contamination in the corn seeds.

Advice had come from officials from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF), the Ministry for the Environment, and the Environmental Risk Management Authority had been involved from the outset.

Miss Clark said officials would give full briefings to "whoever asks for them" including opposition parties and the media.

"I am happy for all Government advice received from Erma, MAF, MFE (Ministry for the Environment) if there's any to be released. There is no issue here. There is no cover-up. There was no evidence of contamination."

She said media could get a full briefing from officials because "the Government has nothing to hide".

"I believe in total disclosure on this. I don't believe there's an issue and believe me, as prime minister, if I was let down on this having been told so strongly, I would be very upset but I have to have some faith that officials tell me the truth."

Opposition parties have called for an inquiry into the whole affair. Miss Clark said today it was "standard opposition technique" to call for an inquiry.

"What I'm happy to have happen, beginning today, is for opposition parties to be given a full briefing on the issue."

"If there's anything there, get it out. I believe in full disclosure and believe me if I haven't been told the truth I'll be the first to be on the warpath."

Miss Clark said she did not know whether the Greens had been in on the release of the book but had been quick to "climb on the back of it".

Ms Fitzsimons and co-leader Rod Donald said the Greens had not known about the book, despite it being published by Craig Potton, No 22 on their party list.

Mr Donald told NZPA Miss Clark had been quick to jump on Hager's book Secrets and Lies, released before the last election, that detailed the public relations strategy used to discourage opposition to native logging by state-owned enterprise Timberlands.

"Labour made enormous political capital out of that scandal."

But now she was crying foul about Hager's latest book.

Mr Donald said she was attacking the very same messenger "who she relied on before the last election to undermine the credibility of National".

Hager said today he first heard of the issue earlier this year while working on a separate book and had only recently finished writing Seeds of Distrust.

"I actually had a quite a lot of mixed feelings and doubt about whether I should publish it the middle of an election ... in the end I decided that if I knew something had gone on which the public would want to know about and be part of the debate, I was actually doing a political act if I put the book off," he told National Radio.

"The reason I wrote this as a book rather than a series of articles was that there is a strong track of evidence and strong argument that I wanted to set down and anyone who looks at the evidence, I think it's pretty undeniable that something major was going on.

"The Government regarded it as a major crisis and yet when they came to telling the public they didn't want it to get out."

He denied manipulating the media by releasing the book's contents to several media outlets before its release.

Russell Poulter, a senior lecturer in genetics at the Otago University's department of biochemistry who is experienced in testing for GM contamination, was asked by Heinz Wattie to provide independent advice.

This morning he said he concluded that the positive results were a false alarm.

"Even in the best laboratories, you will occasionally encounter a false positive," he told National Radio.

"The initial results certainly caused a certain amount of alarm.

"Certainly, all of the results that I have seen, and I contacted Heinz Wattie yesterday just to make sure that there hadn't been more tests and that the picture had changed, all of the results that I have seen and that Heinz Wattie is aware of as of yesterday, indicate that what we had here was a false alarm."

Miss Clark has threatened to pull out of a leaders' debate on TV3 after claiming she was "ambushed" over the genetic modification (GM) debate.

Miss Clark claimed TV3 front man John Campbell was unethical and unprofessional when he ambushed her on Tuesday night over the claims in Nicky Hager's book.

At a media conference in Auckland last night, Miss Clark said the allegations were first put to her without warning on TV3 on Tuesday night.

She said the interview was discussed three times and at no time was the issue of GM raised as a topic.

"As the interview progressed Mr Campbell levelled serious accusations at me along the lines of what I now know are in Mr Hager's book."

It only became clear to her yesterday morning when she heard of the release of information about Hager's book "where Mr Campbell's so-called research had come from".

Miss Clark said she was stunned.

"This behaviour by TV3 was a media ambush without precedent in my experience over 21 years as a member of Parliament."

She said that without any advance notice, TV3 set out to interrogate her on a very detailed issue which "I could never, without advance notice and a briefing, have offered any informed comment on at all".

Miss Clark told NewstalkZB Radio she was laying a complaint with the Broadcasting Standards Authority over the TV3 interview.

- NZPA