John Key must assure New Zealand that he has closed down the Black Ops attack unit in his office, and promise to sever all contact with blogger Cameron Slater, the Green Party said today.
“John Key has today gone on the defensive making all sorts of excuses for misleading reporters, and Parliament, about his texts to notorious blogger Cameron Slater.” Green Party Co-leader Russel Norman said.
“John Key is trying to confuse New Zealanders but in the process is digging himself deeper into the mess his relationship with Cameron Slater has caused.
“It is not normal for the Prime Minister’s office to leak SIS information to an attack blogger like Cameron Slater.
Until John Key promises to have nothing more to do with Cameron Slater, New Zealanders will never be certain that the power of the Prime Minister’s office is not being used for some kind of dodgy purpose.
“It is genuinely mystifying why John Key won’t cut Cameron Slater loose. If John Key won’t sever all contact with Cameron Slater he should explain why he is so beholden to the man.
“John Key didn’t tell the truth last week when he was asked if he had received a text from Cameron Slater about the Inspector General of Security Intelligence’s report. He replied ‘no’ despite the fact he’d been texting Slater the night before. It’s no more or less complicated than that.
“The really concerning thing is, if John Key was so quick to mislead reporters and Parliament that time, how many other times has he misled the public?
“John Key has only made this scandal worse in the last few days by saying Slater had his new phone number because all reporters were given it. You’ve got to wonder how he thought he’d get away with that when many of the reporters he was talking to didn’t have the number themselves!” Dr Norman said.
