Donations ‘wrongly filed’: Bridges

National leader Simon Bridges is denying any wrongdoing over donations, as his own MP suggests election law was broken.

Minutes ahead of being accused by Bridges of leaking his expenses, National MP Jami-Lee Ross tweeted out that he had been asked by Bridges to ‘‘do things with election donations that broke the law’’.

It is not clear if this allegation is related to a donations claims story that was leaked to The AM Show over the weekend.

That leak revealed that Bridges received two donations earlier this year which were later transferred to the National Party, causing him to file a late return one donation of $14,000 from healthcare equipment company Cubro and one donation of $10,000 from the Cathedral Club.

Cubro is run by Logan Currie, who is also the managing director of Exclusive Brethren school OneSchool Global. According to blog posts by National insiders, the Cathedral Club is a dinner series with influential speakers from the political world.

Bridges said these donations were wrongly filed as candidate donations but should have always been filed as party donations.

Electoral law treats candidate donations and party donations quite differently. Candidate donations over $1500 or more must be declared alongside the identity of the donor, but the identity of party donors must only be declared if the amount is more than $15,000.

The Electoral Commission’s candidate handbook states that when a donor does not specify if a donation is to a party or candidate, the presumption is that it is intended for the party. Candidates are required to transfer these donations to the party secretary.

A spokesman for the National Party said it was a simple mistake that was amended after the party had sought the advice of the Electoral Commission. ‘‘The National Party in Tauranga received the donations, not Mr Bridges,’’ the spokesman said.

‘‘In the process of preparing both the local Candidate and Party Returns, as required by the Electoral Act, two donations were incorrectly attributed to Mr Bridges Candidate Return by the local Tauranga Electorate Committee. ‘‘This error was discovered soon after lodging the Candidate Return, and the Electoral Commission was contacted immediately to seek advice. ‘‘Acting on that advice Mr Bridges’ Candidate Return was amended, and then re-submitted to the Electoral Commission for publication.’’

The party declined to provide a copy of the donation to Stuff to verify that the donation was indeed written out to the Tauranga National Party and not Bridges himself.

A spokeswoman for Cubro said the company’s records showed they had made the donation to National, not Bridges.

The National Party has a long history with the secretive christian sect the Exclusive Brethren. At the 2005 election the Brethren distributed anti-Labour pamphlets that then-leader Don Brash admitted he knew about, after first denying any knowledge.

Ross has been asked for comment.