<&>Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English Version One <&>Copyright 1998 School of Linguistics & Applied Language Studies <&>Victoria University of Wellington <&>side one <&>0:48 yeah i was <,> i wasn't sure when i heard about winston peters actually um saying he was going <&>1:00 to form his own party i think that it was more selfserving actually than than for the good of new zealand what do you think of him as a politician er astute but um more of a politician than a statesman <{><[>mm yeah mm <[>mm yes well his timing seems to be sort of the <.>he <.>a the art of sort of um keeping people on this voc in suspense isn't he really tut i thought i thought that the the audience he was he was aiming at wasn't really he was aiming at people who were gullible enough into believing that that he was he was going to save them from all sorts of ills people who didn't have much idea what was going on in the economic situation now didn't think he was kind of aiming at at people who were well educated or anything like that attitude you mean sort of messianic er sort of thing <{><[>you know the <[>YES yeah um well i don't know in his tauranga electorate um <.>mi er probably some sort of it's fairly conservative <&>2:00 electorate a lot of older people there who've um i mean it's sort of i think we've got to the stage with national and labour where it's sort of a plague on both your houses and <{1><[1>so anybody <{2><[2>who offers an alternative is going to be listened to <[1>laughs <[2>mm and there's a high proportion of retired people in tauranga <{><[>and the retired people have been lied to by both the main parties on superannuation and so on <[>oh mm er <,> can i go into this a bit more er <.>w with <{1><[1>the bolger now when he er when he said to them that they couldn't deliver on their promises which were to abolish the surtax <{2><[2>and instead they slashed the benefits he gave as one of his main reasons the debacle at the bank of new zealand that they had to bail the bank of new zealand out <,> now it so happens <.>th that the bulk of the money they paid to voc er bail out the bank of new zealand they received an interest rate of fifteen percent which is a mighty high interest rate <[1>mm <[2>exhales mm and is very different from the impression that <&>3:00 there had to be a taxpayer handout without recompense the cash flow they got from the bank of new zealand er WOULD have been enough <.>s to sustain the er benefits after a er after a pause of a couple of months or so it wasn't the <.>he handout but er the impression was given and so there was a there was a real deception there mm and er winston peters has capitalised on that and er i do believe him when he says that there are things in the bank of new zealand which haven't been um revealed and er that um tut justified an inquiry do you think er jack that this um business <.>th <.>th BANK of new zealand officials themselves are keeping um quiet on this er fifteen percent in case other things come out in the wash then oh no there's no <.>s there's no secret about it <&>4:00 it's just that that impression has been given politically no before the bank of new zealand er takeover <.>her i rang one of them to get the particulars of it of <{1><[1>that and er he was quite open about it it's er rather complex the bulk of the money was um tut to be er interest rate was to be paid at fifteen percent by the bank of new zealand and <.>d this was done by forfeiting their tax free status i mean companies normally pay <{2><[2>taxation <[1>mhm <[2>right mhm but the bank of new zealand er well it didn't have to pay tax because of accumulated losses exhales er well they forfeited that tax free status and that was the mechanism by which the right fifteen percent was paid back now i think the balance was largely in shares on which a dividend was paid so the overall return to the government mhm was i think considerably above <&>5:00 the normal ruling rate of interest at the time they er came into office but but why do you think that winston peters is picking up on this i mean surely YES he agrees that it's been a debacle but why is he picking up on it is it for <.>h out of his concern for his electorate or is it because he wants to use it for his own political purposes tut i think it's a mixture i <.>res once read a book er which er er noted with approval the saying the recognition that all motives are mixed is the beginning of all wisdom <{><[>laughs <[>laughs <,,> exhales inhales yeah probably quite true but how long can he hold this charisma of the <{><[>people is another question because i mean um the the announcement of the um inhales new zealand first party has been very short on um er <.>sis mm i always get this word muddled up <[>MM specific <{><[>facts <[>facts mm and um er er er <.>he he's got to sort of go to a lot more detail and whether he can follow up with <&>6:00 effective candidates who'll sort of er be sufficient BACK up for him or whether it's just going to be a one colt <{><[>party <[>yeah well that's the thing isn't it er they they said that everyone wants winston peters for their own electorate but there's only one winston peters and tauranga got to him first so how is he going to get these people in these electorates <{><[>mm <[>well er i <.>nota noticed today there's um one highly prospective who er is um <,> er reasonably well known that's er ian shearer is that right <{1><[1>yep <{2><[2>it was in the sunday star today <[1>mm <[2>is that right really the <.>t er <.>e there's a suggestion that he he could well be a candidate for deputy leader <{><[>and onehunga is a fairly likely electorate for him <[>mm tut because winston peters did say i think it was on friday that <.>he he was fairly sure of getting onehunga as well but he wasn't going to reveal who his candidate was well <,,> mm mm yes so <.>th that made me take things more seriously yeah and i saw that they edged out the alliance <&>7:00 for third place in the first opinion poll but but people were expecting a lot more of it i'm i'm not sure what to expect from the new zealand first party <{1><[1>people seem to think <.>th <{2><[2>they're a credible party for <.>l governorship but i i <{3><[3>tend to word no <[1>yes <[2>but <[3>i don't i don't take that too seriously because er it's er the opinion polls after they've been going for about a month or more give a better idea mm mm i don't <.>th i don't rate the success of the new zealand first party personally i think people always tend to go back to the tried and true when a general election comes by i don't know about <{><[>this one <[>oh i don't know about that i think people were sort of absolutely fed up with the um first past the post er system and so on like that or despite peter shirtcliffe's <{><[>advertisements and so on <[>oh well um i come back to tried and true um the point is that the two major parties have been tried and found untrue <,,> oh <.>but i think i think there is a a <.>c almost a consensus among <.>a among most people that <&>8:00 that what they did needed to be done and yes they did it in an underhand method but we did need to get ourselves out of the financial straits we were in that's the that's the kind of undercurrent that in the circles i've been moving in is is the thing okay we don't like having to pay huge student fees and we don't like the the big big hurts that have been done to the people but they were necessary in a way to get new zealand out of the trouble it's in er okay buying that to a degree was it necessary to er go about it the way it's been done with the deception and so on mm <{><[>yes yeah mm <[>a lot of <.>dama a great deal of damage has been done particularly under the douglas side think of um those nineteen eighty four to eighty <{><[>seven years of everything in the garden voc everything all go and then <[>laughs mm BUST <{><[>how much did that cost the country <[>that's so right mm <,> mm <,> word and um er national promised er the decent society er i tend to think they left <&>9:00 the s out of the spelling <{><[>laughs <[>laughs laughs yeah well i think er <.>it it's a little bit of pity that er more publicity was not given before the initial referendum <.>o on m m p <{><[>and and single <&>pronounced as sayingle transferable vote <&>pronounced as brote um we considered um er single transferable vote at one stage and decided that perhaps m m p was ahead by a nose and er on that <[>oh er who are you speaking for er er well perhaps i'd better speak for myself <{><[>laughs laughs <[>laughs <[>laughs <.>we it was quite interesting i <.>was just been doing a public law course and we had sir geoffrey palmer of course the architect of all these things and um HE PERSONally is a big advocate of m m p and he chose the royal commission and we had an interesting question from a student well if you're in charge of it <&>10:00 and you advocate m m p isn't it easy for you to pick people who are going to agree with you so and the royal commission which recommended it was kind of the tool of sir geoffrey palmer and if he wanted it surely they probably would want it too so is it really the best system for new zealand or is <,> there another word er i don't think a royal commission would be swayed um er just by or um that markedly by sir geoffrey palmer they would take in a variety of things oh yes <{><[>but the the thing was he got to to choose them and he would probably have chosen people who agreed with him was the was the comment from the student mm i thought it was laughs <[>word er i don't know mm you you feel that er sir geoffrey palmer will be just what <.>d do you sort of impartial er legally correct very much so <{><[>laughs yeah er yeah i'm i i DO <.>th <.>h that was his reply he said that he could have done any manner of <&>11:00 things if he wanted to but but for example when choosing sir robin cook to the presidency of the court of appeal it's the same thing he consulted <.>wi widely and didn't really take politics into account so probably the the the same <.>si stands for the royal commission but the um point of view it's quite interesting <[>laughs well go back some years to when i was working in the labour department mhm and er i was working on the follow up to the original woodhouse proposal for accident <{><[>compensation <[>oh wow yeah er well er er the follow up to that um tut er we were doing it but um <.>n not um very er not very speedily <{><[>and er the <.>mini the minister at the time wanted to things er done quickly so er er so a few of us were locked in a room and had to produce some er <[>laughs as it was in those word exhales follow up follow up pretty quickly well we weren't literally locked in but closeted you might say mm <&>12:00 anyhow the follow up to that was er a group of us had to produce a um follow up paper outlining the issues which would then go to a <.>sele select committee i was the junior of er those ones in the department there was one of the er assistant secretaries in other words one of the second in in <{><[>command the office solicitor and myself <[>mm mhm and we brought er one chap in who i didn't <&>telephone rings know at the time but um more recently became much more well known name of geoff palmer oh laughs is that right so er i made a submission on the latest round of accident compensation er proposals and er before i put it in i had to vet it by er sir geoff laughs <,> yeah no he's imMENsely talented man immensely talented yes such a mind on him he's VERY very quick yeah yeah i noticed the way he went went through those submission er it was almost like a <&>13:00 vacuum cleaner er sucking up the facts mm mm mm apparently his son as well is um is is a very brilliant young man <{1><[1>he's at <{2><[2>harvard at the moment <[1>mm <[2>word yes sir geoffrey's <.>s suffered from the public word of being rather dull <{1><[1>and yet <.>i i understand um from my boss whose um husband was in politics at one stage that um er he's a very witty <{2><[2>and and entertaining speaker at dinner parties and er <[1>MM laughs <[2>oh mm he's <.>a an incredibly witty lecturer apparently he used to be quite ferocious but now he he's toned down a bit in word laughs <{1><[1>word i suppose he's had a bit of his own medicine in <{2><[2>parliament has he <[1>word <[2>laughs yes well i <.>r i remember when he was when he was prime minister and i was still at high school and and everyone thought he was exceedingly dull and quite stupid for doing pranks like playing the trumpet around the beehive and things like that i mean he just looked like a fool mm mm mm yeah that didn't seem his style at all no no laughs mm <&>14:00 his type of humour'd be er rather more the forensic type laughs tut yes oh brilliant lecturer though i learnt so much from word the deadly wit in other words laughs quite yeah mm his voc his protege mai chen is also an excellent lecturer actually i think he'd rather like the one like er of the er judge who er after taking a case um before pronouncing a verdict tut swallows asked the um accused if he had anything to say and the accused said as god is my judge i am not guilty the judge said <{><[>he's not i am you are <[>word laughs brilliant laughs exhales laughs mm mm <&>14:54 <&>end of sample