Ross releases donation texts
Rogue MP Jami-Lee Ross has released a text message exchange relating to the $100,000 donation that Ross alleges came from a single businessman but was illegally hidden in smaller chunks.
The text messages were with National Party general manager Greg Hamilton, but once again do not provide an obvious smoking gun for Ross’ allegations.
In theSeptember 12 exchange Ross asks if it is a ‘‘sticking point’’ that there has been some trouble tracking some individual donors of the wider load of money, all of whom gave under $15,000.
Hamilton replies that the party does need a name and address and ‘‘many of the addresses provided don’t match what is on the electoral role’’.
He then asks if there was a particular person who organised the donations, to which Ross replies ‘‘It was Simon Bridges that arranged the donation, or group of donations.’’
Ross asks if to comply with the law the money should be returned, to which Hamilton replies ‘‘maybe but that would be a shame’’, before asking what else can be done to try and line up the donors with real addresses.
Bridges has denied any wrongdoing and said that Ross has defamed him.
The police are looking into the matter.
Alongside the messages yesterday, Ross sent a message to journalists saying the texts ‘‘show the National Party knew about the legality issues with the donation back in September. I had also been telling them back then that Simon Bridges was the one offered the donation.
‘‘Their statement that they knew nothing of it, was false.’’
National Party President Peter Goodfellow released the same text messages minutes after Ross on yesterday afternoon.
‘‘There has been speculation that we have received a $100,000
‘‘It was Simon Bridges that arranged the donation, or group of donations.’’
Jami-Lee Ross
donation, there was no such donation.
‘‘The Botany Electorate of the National Party received eight donations, and Mr Ross declared eight donations to us. Mr Ross has also said that he will be releasing some text messages between himself and Greg Hamilton. To ensure you see the entire conversation we are releasing these four text messages,’’ Goodfellow said.
The scandal erupted on Monday when Bridges released a PWC report which pointed to Ross as the person who had likely leaked Bridges’ travel expenses to Newshub.
Just before his press conference, Ross tweeted to say Bridges was going to ‘‘pin’’ the leak on him, and accused Bridges of asking him to commit electoral fraud.
Ross followed those tweets up with a surprise press conference on Tuesday where he detailed the allegation – basically that Bridges asked that a single $100,000 donation from Zhang be split up into smaller segments as to remain anonymous.
Bridges has denied any wrongdoing, and said that the donations were coming from Zhang and his supporters – not just Zhang – and that Ross himself was the one organising it.