Now we know that Winston Peters is getting on a bit, but he claimed to be ignorant as to why the Police would be connecting NZ First and Winston Peters with a meeting between the National and Act leaders. He's obviously forgotten this, but fortunately, Stuff's archives haven't:
Winston Peters flew into Invercargill yesterday claiming he had information most of the New Zealand media wanted to know – what was in the Teapot Tapes.
He didn't disappoint the sizeable media contingent at the Invercargill Workingmen's Club, revealing in dramatic style what Prime Minister John Key apparently told John Banks during their now infamous cup of tea.
He said Mr Key had told Mr Banks the next leader of the ACT Party should be Catherine Isaac, the party's former president and No2 list candidate.
"Here is the leader of the National Party telling Mr Banks, on whose coat-tails (ACT) hope to get back into Parliament, who the new leader of the ACT Party should be," Mr Peters said. "And that person is, according to Mr Key, Ms Isaac. That caught you unaware, didn't it?"
He said Mr Banks had described ACT leader Don Brash as "a strange fellow" and that Mr Key had then said "we've been down that road before".
Whilst the Police were investigating Mr Ambrose and his motives in recording the conversation between Key and Banks, any Police officer with a better nose than Inspector Clouseau would wonder how Winston Peters came to be in possession of a conversation that occurred at a meeting that he wasn't at.
The police seized, under a search warrant, text messages between Mr Ambrose and a number of other individuals. There's nothing at all unusual about that. And if Mr Ambrose happened to have entered Winston Peters' name in his contacts, that name would show up on any text messages between the two.
This is the kind of stuff that Peters thrives on. He will deny that the Storm in a Teacup helped get him back into Parliament, but he gleefully broadcast the news that he knew what was in the conversation, just as he has claimed to have seen Peter Dunne's e-mails and phone records.
This time however, he's moaning because his role in this saga has been exposed. He's claiming to be an injured innocent, but that simply won't wash.
Winston Peters has built a political career out of innuendo, attacks under parliamentary privilege, telling half-truths and far more. This time however his chickens have come home to roost, and we have no sympathy for him whatsoever.
