Photo: (L-R) Patrick O'Meara, Lee Taylor, Jessica
Mutch, Gyles Beckford, Jane Patterson, Andrea Vance and Nicky Hager. Photo: RNZ
/ Jeremy Brick
All these journalists are according to the Prime
Minister ‘Left-wing’ conspiracy theorists working to bring down the government;
all are controlled by the Far-left, Labour Party, Green Party and New Zealand
First. Plus it would seem you can put the Maori Party and even Peter Dunne…into the same camp, it
would seem that only David Seymour supports the Nats...what else can he do?
If a vote
was held on banning overseas trust funds it would be successful so long as
Peter Dunne showed some courage and was prepared to stand tall.
1. This report from Radio New Zealand explains how
the above journalists came together to analyse and explain the real meaning of
the Panama documents…
Two weeks after RNZ, One News and
Nicky Hager joined forces to tackle the Panama Papers; Alex van Wel looks back
at how and why the collaboration came about.
RNZ and TVNZ aren't natural
bed-fellows.
We at RNZ float in a delightfully
non-commercial world, guided by our Charter's public interest. Audience size is
critical to us, of course, but we sometimes pretend it isn't. TVNZ, on the
other hand, openly fights it out in the battle for ratings.
The question is whether we turn it to
our advantage, or hold onto old ways.
Digging into the Panama Papers - Click here for full Panama
Papers NZ coverage
Still, the notion of a partnership
with TV came as a shock to many RNZers.
More than anything, they asked why?
But it took the journalists - the only
ones in New Zealand with access to all the documents that make up the Panama
Papers - only seconds to realise the
benefits of collaboration, of sharing our knowledge, our expertise, and our
ideas.
They saw the answer in a flash: none
of us are better than all of us.
We agreed in our first joint meeting
to be open about our work and to publish or broadcast our findings
simultaneously.Instead of racing each other to a half-baked headline, we'd give
the story the time and thought it deserved.
Even the most hardened amongst us was
surprised by this spontaneous meeting of minds.
"Wow. That was good,"
investigative journalist Nicky Hager emailed me after the first meeting. Nicky,
TVNZ's Editor News gathering Phil O'Sullivan and I quickly put down a few simple
ground rules and unleashed the hounds.
Lists of names and companies to
investigate were shared immediately, emails spun around with leads, lines of
enquiry and ideas on how to divide up the work.
But access was a problem and training
had to be done via a dodgy video link to Latin America.
Then the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) announced it was making some of the Panama Papers data public today - 9 May, putting the pressure on us to come up with something quickly.
Three RNZers, three TVNZers and Nicky got together in a small, stuffy room in RNZ's Wellington office, and started digging.
Methodical checking in a database of
over 11 million documents takes patience, organisation and persistence. I
dropped in from time to time to assess the mood.
There was a bit of hesitancy at first,
as the team got used to this new world of collaboration, but within a few hours
any nosy editors entering the room were roundly ignored.
Intense discussion over this lead,
that company, this trust, that fund, absorbed them.
Chocolate, popcorn, and other
gluten-laden treats littered the desk, reporter debris was everywhere.
The focus was the story: TVNZ and RNZ
divisions evaporated.
There wasn't much sleep, but the
enthusiasm was clear.
"I love it," said RNZ's
political editor Jane Patterson at the end of a 12-hour day last Monday.
By Wednesday a coverage plan had
materialised, with 6am yesterday set as our target for story one. To read the
full report, go to:
2. To
hear how the Prime Minister reacted to the Panama papers question listen to Q1
from Andrew Little, and Q2 from James Shaw…Q4 from NZF Ron Mark these three
questions reveal a PM in complete denial mode. His attack on deaf Green MP Mojo
Mathers was absolutely the sign of a twisted and bitter man…who seems to love
attacking innocent females.
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