Paul Holmes: What a week

Paul Henry. Photo / Greg Bowker.

It's been a mad dash of a week in which my feet seemed not to touch the ground.

Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever slow up. Sometimes I wonder if I'm frightened to, for whatever reason I've no idea.

Monday night was remarkable. SkyCity organised a huge Auckland fundraiser for the people of Christchurch, for Bob Parker's Mayoral fund to help people who are still in limbo after the quake.

Bob spoke beautifully. Each table had a celebrity, to use a word I detest. I figured the purpose of the celebrity was to drive the rest of the table into bidding. I was bought by Telecom, which was very nice of them, after what I told their chief executive a few months back about what I thought of his company.

This was the work of their wily corporate affairs manager, Tina Symmans. During the auction Paul Reynolds came and sat next to me and bidded very generously on a lot which would see a couple of kids attend the opening game of the Rugby World Cup. He approached the auction with a certain Scottish caution and was very good-natured about continuing to bid when I sat right next to him, and started bidding to drive him up. He won the prize and signed the cheque.

Later, in a careless moment, I got caught trying to get another thousand for the last lot of the evening and ended up spending thousands of dollars on 10 tickets for a chance to meet the singer Jack Johnson. I had to suck that in. I was swept by a wave of self-loathing, which I knew would be even worse next day when I told my wife.

But then again, I thought, this is for Christchurch and Christchurch was where I started my career and Christchurch people were always kind to me when I arrived there in May, 1972. So what the heck, I thought. Then a woman appeared behind me from a major corporate and offered to buy the tickets off me, not quite for the price I paid but good enough and she's been as good as her word. So wifey's not going to be so mad now, I thought to myself.

Then I headed off to Nelson to see my old friend and colleague Richard Griffin for the night. I needed to have a long talk to him.

Late that afternoon, my wife called to say that Julie Christie's office had been trying all day to get hold of me. I called Julie who was in Cannes and she asked me to do This is Your Life. Why? I asked. Because of Paul Henry's suspension, she told me.

That was the first I had heard of that development. I was tempted to say that under no circumstances could I take a man's programme when he was experiencing bad times and I would never forgive someone doing it to me but then I thought, well, what the hell, what could I do but accept?

I wouldn't want to even begin to compare Paul's transgression with my own notorious faux pas of some years back. And I ain't going to.

But I've watched the newspaper hysteria this week with an unpleasant sense of déja vu. I remember a terrible fortnight that I thought would never end. I read later, after the storm was over, of Alistair Campbell's theory of crisis, which is that if you can last 11 days, I think it is, then you'll survive. It could have gone either way.

But I cannot imagine why Paul Henry took on the Herald as he did, yelling and cussing at them outside his property. He's media himself, for God's sake. He knows what grist to the media mill that kind of behaviour is. Nevertheless, strangely enough, I don't think Henry is actually badly damaged by what's happened and I think, in the end, that TVNZ handled it well and I think the public does too.

But the problem for Henry and the company is not the public. There is a certain crowd who will love to pull him down because he is simply too successful. This is the schadenfreude factor and it is very powerful. The company's and Henry's problem now is the corporates, the advertisers, the politicians and now the Government of India. Once that international stuff starts happening, then things get scary.

But he will be tempered by what he's going through and if he's not then there is really something wrong with him. I'll be honest with you and say that I feel for him. Believe me, what he's going through is traumatising.

Steven Joyce's comments this week were pertinent, coming as they did from an old radio man.

Broadcasting management like their stars to walk a line. Indeed, to become a broadcasting star, you have to. It has always been so. You must also be good at the real stuff, the serious stuff, but those who stand out always project an edge, a sense of danger. Inevitably, one day, you'll cross the line and when that happens life gets very lonely.

It is not, after all, written into any contract that they want you to walk a fine line of controversy. And if you cross that fine line of controversy it becomes a hassle for management dealing with the fallout. And when that particular line gets crossed, management may well let you go.

I wondered about the Andi Brotherston line the moment I read it. Snookered, I thought. Andi is a very nice person. She is married to a good friend of mine, Marty Devlin. Andi doesn't have an unpleasant bone in her body.

Years ago, as a TV3 reporter, Andi was parked in my street wanting to get shots and a comment from me about something. I can't for the life of me remember what the issue was.

But, whatever, I wasn't talking. Andi rang me. I said, "Andi, as a friend of mine you're welcome at my house any time. As a TV3 reporter you can f*** off." We still laugh about it. They were right at TVNZ not to accept her offer to resign. Andi is a lovely woman and she is very good at her job.