October 31, 2019 2:00pm by David Farrar

Another day, another Twyford lie

Stuff reports:

For the second day in a row, beleaguered Transport Minister Phil Twyford appears to have given Parliament incorrect information, crucial documents leaked to Stuff reveal.

He only misleads Parliament on days ending with a Y!

The latest leak revolves around a NZTA assessment of a New Zealand Super Fund proposal to build Auckland’s light rail. Last week Twyford told Parliament that NZTA “didn’t complete an assessment” of the NZ Super Fund’s proposal to build the multibillion-dollar light rail project.
The existence of an assessment, denied by Twyford, is significant because NZTA’s former board said it used the document to justify its dismissal of the Super Fund’s plan. 

Leaked documents obtained by Stuff show that the NZTA assessment was in fact complete enough to send to the NZ Super Fund for a response.

Basically NZTA had completed their assessment. NZSF simply didn’t like it and lobbied Twyford to reject it.

Another Stuff article gives a nice summary of all the Twyford troubles:

  • Denied NZTA board members wished to stay on, when they did
  • Denied he had received any correspondence from Julie Anne Genter about transport in Wellington when he had
  • Denied discussing the NZTA board with photographer and blogger Patrick Reynolds despite having dinner with Reynolds shortly before appointing him
  • Denied NZTA had completed an assessment of the NZSF proposal, when they had

Coughlan notes:

If it’s true that Twyford forgot he’d asked someone to be a guardian of that $4b pot of money, well that starts to look pretty negligent. No one begrudges a minister for not knowing niche details of their portfolio, but if you’d asked someone to be on the board of your key agency – of $4b – well, you think you’d remember that. 

But again his job is safe. A mere three or four false answers and f***ing up the two largest infrastructure projects the Government has is definitely not grounds for losing your job. So long as he doesn’t assault his press secretary, his job is safe.