PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. From time to time members bring to you concerns about parliamentary questions not being answered. I would like to bring to you a concern that I have, which has somewhat of a difficult twist, and I would like your guidance. I put written parliamentary questions to the Minister of Housing some 3 weeks ago and the answers were returned on 1 March. When I put one of the answers to the media, because it was about rental incomes for State house tenants, the media went to the Minister about an income for a State house tenant that was $113,000 after tax. The Minister told the media at that stage, over the weekend, that in fact that figure was in question, that it was not correct, and that he would do some work on it. When I raised this with the Minister after the weekend, on the Monday, he told me through my staff member that no, the figure was actually correct. When I did a general press release a day after, apparently the answer to the question was incorrect again.
I raise this with you because this has caused two problems. First of all, it has meant that today I have had to use one of my party’s oral questions to get the real answer from the Minister, and, secondly and more important, I understood that the Minister in answering parliamentary questions was obligated to go to the member immediately he knew that his answer was incorrect, and to the House and Parliament immediately he knew that the answer was incorrect, not go to the media. I still have not had the corrected answers, some 2 weeks from when those written questions were put to the Minister. Could you give me some guidance on this?
Madam SPEAKER