Helen Clark has been trying to shift the blame for the unlawful election spending from the parties to the Parliamentary Service (PS). She – and other politicians – says that the dispute is really between the Auditor General and the PS. The parties argue that because this authority approved their unlawful expenditure it must therefore have been legal and if it wasn’t then any legal debt should be with the PS.
But, according to The Press, the PS apparently believe that they only ‘had only an accounting role in paying advertising accounts and that it was up to MPs to make sure their spending stayed within the law.’ National’s Gerry Brownlee has agreed, saying according to The Press, that ‘it was MPs, not the Parliamentary Service, who were responsible for making sure their spending was within the rules.’ Also in the NZ Herald report, Brownlee says that ‘Ultimately members are personally responsible for the way they and parliamentary political parties use the public resources entrusted to them.’ The Herald article backs this up, saying that ‘The principles [of the rules] expressly state MPs are "personally responsible" for the way they and their parties use public money and that the responsibility "cannot be avoided".’
