War of words as National squabbles over selection

By BERNARD ORSMAN

Senior National Party officers have been accused of disregarding party rules and democracy in the hotly contested selection battle for Helensville.

Party correspondence obtained by the Weekend Herald reveals how upset supporters of long-serving MP Brian Neeson were at the behaviour of Auckland party officers before Mr Neeson was dumped in March.

He lost the party nomination for the safe National seat by four votes to 40-year-old millionaire banker John Key.

The Herald last month revealed the role National Party president Michelle Boag played in pulling a third candidate, airline pilot Ian Lupton, out of the contest so Mr Key would have a better chance.

Claim and counter-claim over the behaviour of northern divisional chairman Scott Simpson and divisional chief executive Alan Croot are in party minutes, emails, reports and letters.

Claims include:

* Mr Croot disrupted the democratic process by ruling an irregularity in the ballot paper at a meeting to select 34 voting delegates from the Hobsonville branch. He sealed the voting papers, declared no result and referred the matter to the party's rules committee.

* Mr Croot made a declaration at the Hobsonville meeting allowing only one member of a household to be nominated as a delegate.

* Because the electorate lacked the membership for 60 voting delegates, Mr Simpson topped up the 42 local delegates by hand-picking the other 18 delegates. Of these, 12 were from outside the electorate. Party rules say top-up members shall be from the electorate "where possible, but may be drawn from outside the electorate".

* Mr Simpson delayed the final selection meeting by about 25 minutes so a delegate known to support Mr Key could arrive. Delegates are normally given 10 minutes to arrive after the starting time before the doors are locked.

The rules committee upheld Mr Croot's actions and the Hobsonville meeting was held again using a different ballot paper.

This did not satisfy one of the Hobsonville scrutineers and a Neeson supporter, Gordon Waugh, who wrote his own report.

"It appeared to me that Mr Croot was making up the rules to suit himself."



Waitakere electorate chairman Mate Milich also wrote to Mr Simpson saying that the events were not the way "any of us wish to have the party run".



Mr Croot told the Weekend Herald that the Hobsonville branch meeting was so skewed and such a shambles, due mostly to Mr Neeson and his team, that he had to seize the ballot, and seek advice from the party's rules committee.





Mr Simpson said he did not see any reason to lock the doors on the delegate who arrived late at the March 16 selection meeting.

He said the nub of the issue was that Mr Neeson was still hurting. "That's life. That happens. That's tough."

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