Police-paid spy infiltrated office - Green Party

Police-paid spy infiltrated office - Green Party
The Green Party is furious that police-paid spy Rob Gilchrist infiltrated its offices and was used to report on the party's activities.
Green MP Keith Locke said there were rules about how police could act in Parliament's precincts and he would be writing to Prime Minister John Key, Police Minister Judith Collins and Police Commissioner Howard Broad with his concerns.
Mr Locke said that former MP Nandor Tanczos' secretary Rayna Fahey called the party after the story about Mr Gilchrist's activities broke. Rochelle Rees, the ex-partner of Mr Gilchrist, alleged at the weekend that he had been spying on peaceful protests groups for years. Ms Rees, an animal rights and Labour Party activist, discovered Mr Gilchrist had been paid by counter-terrorism police to spy on the protest groups when she helped him fix his computer. She discovered emails between him and police. Ms Fahey told the Green Party that Mr Gilchrist had befriended her and had been "keen" to visit the office and asked a lot of questions. This happened in 2005, some time around the election. "There are clear police protocols in Parliament between the Speaker and the police," Mr Locke said. "It is very disturbing that police would be conducting surveillance on a political party, including its MPs." Mr Locke said Mr Gilchrist had also been on a Green Party database getting access to information about policy and activities.

This story just keeps getting worse doesn’t it. How the hell could we have given cops all these powers when they are using them to infiltrate legitimate protest groups like Greenpeace and SAFE to find out activists sex lives – is that what they have extra Police powers for, to spy on the sex lives of activists, how the hell is that in the national security interest? And now their Police spy was involved in probing the Green party – a political party, cops have filthy spies inside a Political Party – this is despicable within a democracy and it makes Judith Collins assurances from Howard Broad seem very weak.

It’s a reminder to work in very small cell groups for all your actions against the state in 2009.