Forum Archive Index - July 2000

[rocket <who.c@res.co.nz>]

Now that bother boy Richard Prebble has offended
the sensibilities of the members of the parliament club,  by dobing
in Dover Samuels to the headmistress ("just not the done thing old boy"),
will Richard's past misdeeds come out into the open?

One of Richard's past deeds, which raised my eyebrows at the time, was the sale of the then state owned enterprise, Petrocorp.

The Treasury conducted the sale process on behalf of the government, and selected the U K gas utility British Gas as the winning bidder.

As soon as the winning bid been announced Richard overturned the treasury decision, and announced Fletcher Challenge as the purchaser.

The reason that Richard gave was that British Gas was not a New Zealand company but Fletcher Challenge was.

This explanation seemed to me to be a bit thin. A the Minister in charge of the sale process surely if was his intention to sell only to N Z companies he could have instructed the treasury to sell accordingly. I was surprised that this capricious decision did provoke an outcry at the time.

Maybe there is someone out there who was intimately involved in the sale process and knows what really went down.

Cheers Rocket
 
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