Lie #9,087,425

From the NZ Herald:

Mr Peters did not return calls last night. Despite being asked, he has never said when he became aware of the trust. On July 29 he told a press conference that he had no knowledge of what the trust was used for.

So he said he had no knowledge of what the trust was used for.

The Herald has learned Mr Peters was aware of how much money was kept in the trust at certain times, and that he directed staff to get it to pay party expenses from 2005 onwards.

This is no surprise.

But the trust’s existence was kept so secret it paid over $100,000 in bills that senior party officials did not even know they had.

The Spencer Trust’s bill payments for the party included $87,648 in 2006 – but the party’s president, secretary and treasurer from that time yesterday said they had no idea the bills even existed, yet alone that they were paid.

The Deputy Leader is also on the record as saying he had never heard of The Spencer Trust. So that doesn’t make it hard to conclude who did. Meanwhile Helen says that Winston should not be held liable for the mistake of the staff in the party head office. First of all the party head office is his Ministerial bauble suite, and secondly no Officer except Peters even knew about it.