Will Wood face Privileges Committee also?
The Herald reports:
Transport Minister Michael Wood did not immediately declare shares he owned in Auckland Airport when he became an MP or when he later took up the transport portfolio, despite his responsibility for the light rail line the Government promised to build to the airport and his then role as the minister overseeing aviation regulation.
A legal expert believes it could mean Wood is hauled before Parliament’s Privileges Committee facing a charge of contempt – the second senior Labour minister to come before the committee in as many weeks.
Wood has owned the shares since he was a teenager, but only began declaring them in the MPs’ register of pecuniary interests, the public list of MPs’ financial interests, in January 2022.
Now MPs do sometimes make mistakes in their declarations, but they are expected to amend them as soon as they become aware of the error. This “mistake” wasn’t picked up for five years, and even then it was never corrected.
Hipkins did not say whether he would sack Wood.
Hipkins said he would speak with Wood about the Auckland Airport shares today and give an update about Wood at his post-Cabinet press conference.
Hipkins said he was under the impression that Wood did not know he had to declare the shares in such detail.
This excuse could apply to a rookie MP who isn’t very knowledgable about Standing Orders. But Wood has served both as Government Chief Whip and Deputy Leader of the House. Both roles require you to have expert knowledge of Standing Orders. In fact the only people I would expect to have a greater knowledge of Standing Orders would be The Speaker and the Clerk of the House.
The spokesperson said Wood had not initially declared the shares because he believed they were owned inside a trust. He began declaring them properly in January 2022 after he became aware they were held directly.
This is very curious because, like Michael, I also own shares in a number of companies. And you know what – they send me very regular information on the shares – either annually for the tax year, and/or when they pay dividends. And they always list the exact name the shares are under.
So this means Michael never read the dividend or tax statements from the company.
A spokesperson for Wood confirmed Wood “owns shares in Auckland Airport and Contact Energy which he purchased as a teenager in the 1990s”, the spokesperson said.
I have to say it warms the cockles of my heart that young Michael Wood was investing in the sharemarket while at school. More kids should invest their pocket money in the sharemarket. Of course just a short time later he was President of Young Labour. Did his colleagues know what a budding capitalist he was? 🙂
Wood’s lack of declaration is also a potential breach of the Cabinet Manual because of the potential perceived conflict of interest between his ownership of shares in an airport while he was the minister responsible for the aviation sector.
I’d say it was a definite breach.
Now for the avoidance of doubt, I don’t think Wood’s $13,000 of shares is why he wants to spend $29 billion on light rail to the airport. But imagine this was a National Party Minister of Transport who had shares in Auckland Airport and had failed to disclose them. Wood would probably be the first to scream that it is corruption.
Again I don’t think Wood’s motives were malign. I suspect the real motivation is he didn’t want to disclose publicly that he is a little capitalist with shareholding in various companies that he opposed ever being made private.
Now Standing Orders are quite clear on this. Once he became aware his shares were owned directly by him, he should have immediately filed amendments to all the returns already filed – 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 etc. Instead he just listed them in the 2022 return, which means no one would ever know he was a shareholder during the 2017 to 2021 period.
He also has issues with the Cabinet Manual. There is no doubt he should have disclosed these whenever Cabinet was discussing policies or laws that could affect the worth of Auckland Airport. Arguably he also should have sought advice as to whether or not he should recuse himself from any discussions or voting, and delegate portfolio responsibilities for Transport to an Associate.
So the Speaker will decide if he is referred to the Privileges Committee for the Register returns and the PM will decide if he gets as many get out of jail cards for Cabinet Manual breaches as Stuart Nash did.
UPDATE:
Will be interesting to compare this to the 2008 story about John Key’s shareholding in TranzRail being larger than previously disclosed. Labour pursued this as a corruption angle, with quotes being:
- Labour has accused National leader John Key of lying over his ownership of Tranz Rail shares
- The shareholding was first raised by Prime Minister Helen Clark in July, when she accused Mr Key of having a conflict of interest
- “John Key lied because he had something to hide,” Dr Cullen said.
- Labour will now use the non-disclosure as a major platform of attack against Mr Key.
So the equivalent story in 2008 had Labour doing a full frontal attack with the PM and Deputy PM attacking Key, calling him a liar etc etc.
UPDATE2: Hipkins has stood Wood down as Transport Minister while this is investigated. Wood remains a Cabinet Minister on full pay and perks. He just has less work to do for a while.