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The Tea tape scandal is an incident involving the New Zealand Prime Minister John Key and ACT Party candidate John Banks, during the New Zealand general election campaign in 2011. Their meeting in an Auckland café two weeks before election day was seen as a symbolic endorsement of Mr Banks as the National Party's favoured candidate for the Epsom electorate. After publicly meeting for some time, media were asked to leave. A journalist, Bradley Ambrose, left his recording device behind, and subsequently gave the recording of the politicians' conversation to the ''Herald on Sunday'' newspaper, which declined to publish it. The recording allegedly contained comments about the leadership of ACT and disparaging remarks about elderly New Zealand First supporters. The politicians involved considered that their private conversation had been illegally recorded. John Key and the National Party said that it appeared that the Herald had deliberately recorded the conversation, and described it as "''News of the World''-style tactics", however journalists argued that that the recording was in the public interest and should therefore be released. Following a police complaint laid by John Key, search warrants were issued by police to media outlets to obtain all unreleased media involving the taping. In March 2012 Ambrose wrote a letter to John Key and John Banks expressing regret that he had released the recording to the newspaper, and the police decided to issue a warning rather than prosecute. The recording was leaked online on 26 January 2012. ==Background== In the New Zealand electoral system a party can be represented in Parliament if they achieve either 5% of the party vote, or win an electorate seat on a first past the post basis. At the time that this meeting took place the ACT Party was polling poorly,〔 〕 so it was in the National Party's interest that ACT (as a traditional coalition partner with National) win the Epsom seat. To have the Prime Minister (a National Party Member of Parliament) have tea with the ACT candidate was intended to endorse Mr Banks' candidacy in the electorate.〔 〕 The recording, made by freelance cameraman Bradley Ambrose at the Urban Cafe in the suburb of Newmarket, was given to the Herald On Sunday. 3 News also obtained copies of the recording. Neither organisation published the recording.〔 〕 There is speculation that the two politicians were discussing issues related to ACT New Zealand's leadership, and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters claims John Key insulted New Zealand First voters, by saying that they were "dying off".〔 Ambrose maintains he inadvertently left the recording device on the table but was unable to retrieve it when media were ordered to leave the venue. National Party campaign chairman Steven Joyce said that the recording appeared to have been deliberately arranged by the Herald on Sunday, and described it as "UK-style News of the World tabloid tactics". The scandal became known as "the teapot tapes", a term coined by the ''New Zealand Listeners election live blog. Labour leader Phil Goff called the recording a "dodgy conversation between two people trying to manipulate a minor party". Referring to the ACT Party, he said, "That party is supported by less than one percent, people don’t want them there." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Tea tape scandal」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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