Billy Te Kahika, leader of the NZ Public Party, denies encouraging the group to escape from quarantine in Hamilton on Friday night. Photo / Facebook
Billy Te Kahika, leader of the NZ Public Party, denies encouraging the group to escape from quarantine in Hamilton on Friday night. Photo / Facebook
Political party leader Billy Te Kahika has spoken out about his involvement with a young family who are accused of escaping from quarantine in Hamilton.
In a livestream on his Facebook, Te Kahika, leader of the NZ Public Party, talks about how it had been suggested by mainstream media thathe didn't believe Covid-19 was real, much to his annoyance.
"We've never said that ... that's not the issue, we've never said that.
"The issue is what are the consequences emanating out of the Covid-19 crisis, what is it being used to do and we believe wholeheartedly that this epidemic, if you can call it that, is being used to erode our democracy."
Although he hasn't returned calls from the Herald today, he went on to say there were many families in deep distress in lockdown with no idea of what was going on.
"I stand against that. I'm horrified by the stories that are coming my way.
"And no I did not advise that whanau in Hamilton to abscond and leave the quarantine facility ... what I did say was keep calm and take a step back and just see what we could do to help them but unfortunately we weren't able to help them at such a late stage."
He said the family got in touch with him late on Friday and "needed a resolve within hours of doing that".
"But my heart goes out to them big time because their dad got buried at the weekend.
"Despite testing negative they were not allowed to go to the tangi and I find that irreconcilable .. they had proven negative, they had asked for an exemption to go up to Auckland to the tangi and they were declined it."
He went on to say he was shocked to learn the family were told they were going to be quarantined in an Auckland hotel, only to be put on a bus to Hamilton. He likened the incident to something that would happen in North Korea or Soviet Russia.
"When they were taken aside for quarantine this young mother with her four children were told they'd be kept in Auckland but they were put on a bus and bussed to Hamilton.
"This is not Soviet Russia, this is not North Korea ... we don't do things like that to our citizens here in New Zealand. We just don't put you on a bus and take you to a place where the Government wants to take you, we won't stand for it."
He then said his party's goal was to get rid of the Covid-19 Health Response bill.
"That's one of our policies, we're going to get rid of it when we get in there.
"We will be pushing the levers of authority to do that."
He also spoke about his dislike of mainstream media and journalists who only wanted to "test" his party and Jamie-Lee Ross's Advance NZ who he this week announced he had merged with.
"What's the secret with all of this? They're [journalists] actually paid to try and rattle us, that's what they're trying to do, to try and dismantle politicians but even more so, why?
