What is National hiding?

TV3 news coup

Lockwood Smith secretly recorded, suggests National has hidden agenda

Just as Bill English and John Key were moving to shut down the Kiwibank controversy, 3News has received more recordings which suggest National has a hidden agenda.

3News has been in contact with the person who made the secret recordings of Bill English at the National Party Conference on Friday night, who had further secret recordings of Lockwood Smith.

The recordings, where Smith was talking to conference delegates, suggest the National Party have a secret agenda.

Smith was recorded as saying:

"There's some bloody dead fish you have to swallow... to get into Government to do the kinds of things you want to do... and you have to balance up what really matters."

"If you try to do everything differently you'll scare the horses and under MMP it's very hard to win."

"Once we have gained the confidence of the people, we've got more chance of doing more things."

He went on to talk about doing things in government that you could not talk about before an election.

"We may be able to do some things we believe we need to do, perhaps go through a discussion document process... you wouldn't be able to do them straight off. ... I'm hoping that we'll do some useful things that way, that may not be policy right now."

John Key has since said there was no secret agenda, while Prime Minister Helen Clark has said it proved there was some kind of hidden agenda.

Oh no you didn't girlfriend! Lockwood just said what? After Bill English revealed that KiwiBank of all things is on the chopping board because ideologically they have an ‘issue’ with a NZ owned bank, a bank that is a great success by the way, and they intend to sort out Working for families after promising 3 days earlier not to meddle with it. AFTER THAT we now get another secret taping of Lockwood Smith talking about National’s secret agenda.

Last election the far right Don Brash was spun as a moderate, 3 years later his multi-millionaire acolyte John Key is spun as a moderate. Last election National inoculated policy it knew would be unpopular by claiming that they wouldn’t implement it until the second term, 3 years later John Key tells us no privatization or KiwiBank sales or sell off of TVNZ in the first term. Last election National had a secret privatization agenda that they were not going to let the voting public know anything about, 3 years later Bill English privately tells us the KiwiBank sale is eventual and that they will sort out Working for Families after specifically stating that they wouldn’t be touched and Lockwood Smith explains with some candor why Machiavellian tactics are so important when you have a secret agenda to be getting on with. National are pushing for a referendum on MMP even though there was never any promise to hold one because National want a political system that favours them, like the good ole days under FPP and here we have Lockwood Smith admitting "If you try to do everything differently you'll scare the horses and under MMP it's very hard to win.". Hard to win indeed Lockwood, best to have a new system all together huh? How about play to the cynicism towards politicians that the public have every right to have by someone like Lockwood Smith who toured every campus in this country telling every student that National would not bring in student loans, and the very second he won implemented student loans, how about get him to play to a cynicism he helped generate and attack MMP so he can then back a version that can firmly entrench National under a system more beneficial to those who believe they are born to rule.

How bout we don’t do that? How bout we wise up to what National really want to do and vote on that, why can’t National be honest with their policy – if they are so bloody right, why can’t they tell us openly and allow their real ideas to be challenged and debated, how can Democracy win when a Party hides its true intent?

What is National hiding and have they really changed in the 3 years since the Hollow Men?

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