Army under pressure to release bridge report

The Army remains under pressure to release its "secret" report into a bridge collapse that killed a beekeeper as Opposition MPs intensify their efforts to have it handed over.

New Zealand First and National are planning to use parliamentary procedures to try to make public the contents of the report which questions the design and construction of the Army-built bridge.

National MP Shane Ardern wants a parliamentary select committee inquiry into the bridge's failure reopened so the Army can be called to appear.

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters will raise the report's findings under the protection of privilege in Parliament. He tried to release it in Parliament last week but the Government stopped him.

Yesterday former National Party Defence Minister Max Bradford wrote to Prime Minister Helen Clark urging her to insist the Defence Force release the report.

Mr Bradford was repeatedly denied the report by the Army and Defence Force officials.

The Army has consistently refused to release the report, written by Army engineer George Butcher a few months after the bridge failed, citing confidentiality and legal conventions.

The Army built it on Keith and Margaret Berryman's King Country farm as part of a training exercise. The Berrymans' lawyer, Rob Moodie, has said the report criticises the design and structure of the bridge and materials used and raises questions about who was to blame for its collapse.

Kenneth Richards died when the eight-year-old bridge failed, sending his truck plunging 30m into a ravine.

A 1997 coroner's inquiry held the Berrymans partly responsible because they had not properly maintained the bridge.

But Dr Moodie says the coroner was never told about Mr Butcher's findings.

Although the Berrymans tried to get the report confirmed as new evidence so the coroner's inquiry could be reopened, the High Court last year ruled that the Army could keep it confidential after it argued it had been evidence to an internal court of inquiry and was legally protected.

The Defence Force yesterday continued to refuse comment on the case, although its report is now widely available on the internet after Dr Moodie posted it in defiance of the court's decision.

Dr Moodie is due to face Defence Force complaints that he broke court orders in the High Court at Wellington next week.

Yesterday he handed copies of the report for all 120 MPs to Mr Peters, who said it was time Helen Clark and all other MPs read it.

"They're obliged to do their public duty on this," he said.

Mr Ardern said he would seek Opposition support to reopen the 1998 labour select committee's inquiry, which recommended the Berrymans be compensated.

They lost their farm fighting an unsuccessful Department of Labour prosecution over the collapse.