Shearer on the union exemption

You have to listen to this interview on bFM to believe it. David Shearer tries and justifies Labour’s proposal to exempt unions from the lobbying transparency bill. An extract:

“It is more of what I was just saying before umm ethan is that, you know I get you know trade unions or say salvation army or whatever they are standing up for rights of you know workers or rights of the poor or whatever, or whatever it is likely to be. Umm I don’t look to gain have had any sort of, I don’t look to have any material gain from that as a, as a as an MP–but there is what the the idea was is to try and capture the you know the various sort of business and corporate interests that might you know in a sense be trying to do sort of what you know they do offshore (not sure happens here?) is to buy buy politicans off”

Is the leader of the Labour Party really saying he has nothing to gain from unions, when they are both major funders of Labour, but also now get 20% of the vote on who is the Labour Leader? Unions get a major say in Labour candidate selections also. Yet Shearer says they should be specifically exempt from lobbying transparency requirements!

Again, I recommend people listen to the whole interview – it is far from clear and concise!